During the 19th century, the forces of modernity challenged traditional faith and drove a wedge between liberal and conservative believers. "A Nation Reborn" explores slavery, and how it splits the nation as abolitionists and slaveholders find justification in the Bible. Frederick Douglass condemns Christianity; President Lincoln struggles to make sense of the war's carnage and the death of his young son. Lincoln, who previously had favored reason over revelation, embarks on a spiritual journey that transforms his ideas about God and the Civil War's ultimate meaning.