A full recitation takes three days, mornings only. Before sunrise on each morning of the three days the preacher stands at the fireplace of the longhouse and sings the Sun Song to ensure good weather. During the ceremonies the preacher stands before the fireplace, aided by an assistant who sits beside him holding a white wampum strand. Some of the congregation sits on benches placed across the longhouse and the remainder sit on benches placed along the walls. Women cover their heads with a shawl. The atmosphere at the ceremony somewhat resembles a revival meeting. Participants may be moved to tears, and the emotional atmosphere sometimes becomes so contagious that many publicly re-declare their allegiance to the religion. Opposition There is a movement which rejects The Code of Handsome Lake as being too influenced by the First and Second Great Awakenings. These modern traditionalists follow the teachings of Deganawidah, The Great Peacemaker as laid down in the Great Law of Peace, which is the constitution of the Six Nations or Haudenosaunee. Although this constitution protects the rights of religious ceremonies which have been in practice prior to ratification and acknowledges the duties of positive role models to the community, this movement contends that some of Handsome Lake's teachings may contradict existing articles in their interpretation of the Great Law of Peace. Social context The Second Great Awakening was a religious movement in the United States beginning around 1790. It has been described as a reaction against skepticism, deism, and rationalism. This movement was centered in the so-called "Burned-over district" in central and western New York State. Handsome Lake's revelations occurred in the same area and "anticipated by a matter of months the surge of revivals that swept through early national and antebellum America." Influences Joseph Smith, the founder of Mormonism, is believed to have been influenced by Handsome Lake's revelations, with which his own visions share a resemblance. Classification In his 1989 book Popular Religion in America: Symbolic Change and the Modernization Process in Historical Perspective Miami University professor Peter W. Williams stated that over time the movement became more routinized and more resembles "such 'cultic' religions on the borderline of traditional Christianity such as Mormonism." Notes References Hirchefekder, Arlene and Paulette Molin. Encyclopedia of Native American Religions. Checkmark Books. Johanson, Bruce Elliot and Barbara Ellis Mann. Encyclopedia of the Haudenosaunee (Iroquois Confederacy).] Abingdon, UK: Greenwood Publishing Group, 2000. .