A recent phenomenon of charismatic renewal took place in Toronto in the mid-1990s. Commonly known as the Toronto Blessing and operated by the former Vineyard Church leaders John and Carol Arnott, the renewal was defined by reports of uncontrollable laughter, weeping, speaking in tongues, animal noises, and falling on the floor during worship. Sympathetic Christians embraced these practices while others who believed that this form of worship boarded on spectacle rejected them. By the end of the 1990s most people thought that the renewal was over.
Yet, in the first decade of the 21st...