Question

Which action did Walter Rauschenbusch take to gain attention for the social gospel movement on a national level?

Answer 1

The answer to your question is: The action that Walter Rauschenbusch take to gain attention for the social gospel movement on a national level was through the special emphasis of theology. He legalized it to the most American Protestants.

Answer 2

Rauschenbusch established a foundation based on the concepts of the social gospel.

The foundation or group was called "The Brotherhood of the Kingdom," and was founded in 1892 by Walter Rauschenbusch along with Baptist minister Leighton Williams.  Rauschenbusch was a Baptist ministrer also, and later became a professor of theology at Rochester Theological Seminary in Rochester, New York.   The non-denominational Brotherhood of the Kingdom group involved religious leaders from a variety of Protestant churches. As they started the organization, they asserted:  "The Spirit of God is moving men in our generation toward a better understanding of the idea of the Kingdom of God on earth. Obeying the thought of our Master, and trusting in the power and guidance of the Spirit, we form ourselves into a Brotherhood of the Kingdom, in order to re-establish this idea in the thought of the church, and to assist in its practical realization in the world."  They laid out eight principles for the group's social gospel purpose, which included thoughts such as: "Every member shall by personal life exemplify obedience to the ethics of Jesus," and "Each member shall lay special stress on the social aims of Christianity."

Rauschenbusch did also write books promoting the social gospel, but those came after the Brotherhood of the Kingdom had been established in the 1890s.   Some of Rauschenbusch's books were:

Christianity and the Social Crisis ( 1907)

For God and the People: Prayers of the Social Awakening (1910)

Christianizing the Social Order  (1912)

A Theology for the Social Gospel (1917)