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The
Free Religion Movement in Unitarianism:
Opening
the Way for Non-Christians
During the
nineteenth century, the reputation of Unitarianism for being an
inclusive, creedless religion attracted a number of
non-Christians, many of whom might be described as scientific
theists or deists. They longed for a place to gather and worship, but
could not
find such a place in the mainstream churches. It was only
natural that they should find a home in Unitarian churches,
where they experienced fellowship and encouragement, even
though the focus of the sermons and liturgies was Christian.
In some areas, liberal congregations were formed that were
non-Christian in character, and these became associated with
the larger Unitarian organizations. The non-Christians were a minority well into the twentieth
century, but they proved to be very vocal, and several developments
ensured their survival and influence within Unitarianism.
During the 1860's,
the "free religion movement" began to gain strength in the
Unitarian churches. Supporters of this movement were intent on
pursuing religious freedom to its logical conclusion: a
complete openness to all religious sentiments and persuasions.
In 1865, at the first annual meeting of the National
Conference of Unitarian Churches in New York, they urged the
assembly to permit all liberal churches, Christian or not,
into membership of the Conference. However, the majority were
not in favor of this, and in the preamble to the new
constitution, the Christian character of the organization was
affirmed. For the next year, the matter continued to be
debated in sermons, pamphlets, and periodicals. At the next
annual meeting, Francis Ellingwood Abbott proposed a new
preamble to the constitution, which stated that the churches
of the Conference, "disregarding all sectarian or
theological differences, and offering a cordial fellowship to
all who will join them in Christian work, unite themselves in
a common body, to be known as The National Conference of
Unitarian and Independent Churches." The amendment was
rejected. However, at the suggestion of James Freeman Clarke,
it was agreed to change the name of the association to The
National Conference of Unitarian and Other Christian Churches.
It was explained that the expression "Other Christian
Churches" was "not meant to exclude religious
societies which have no distinctive church organization, and
are not nominally Christian, if they desire to co-operate with
the Conference in what it regards as Christian work."
Many of the
progressives were not satisfied with the concession, and on the train back to Boston, a number of
them decided to organize an association of their own that
would guarantee the religious liberty they were seeking and
provide them with an outlet for expressing their views. On May
30, 1867, the Free Religious Association was born. Octavius Brooks
Frothingham was named president. Other notable members were
Cyrus A. Bartol, Francis Ellingwood Abbott, William J. Potter,
John Weiss, David Wasson, John White Chadwick, Louisa May
Alcott and Ralph Waldo Emerson. The group felt strongly in
the universality of religion and that all phases of religious
opinion should be represented in its membership and on their
platform. In the 1872 revision of their constitution, it was
stated that "nothing in the name or constitution of the
Association shall ever be construed as limiting membership by
any test of speculative opinion or belief, --or as defining
the position of the Association, collectively considered, with
reference to any such opinion or belief, --or as interfering
in any other way with that absolute freedom of thought and
expression which is the natural right of every rational
being." The two chief journals of the organization were The
Radical, edited by Sidney H. Morse, and The Index,
edited by Francis E. Abbott. It was often argued in the pages
of these periodicals that it was time to outgrow Christianity
altogether and embrace a universal theism that
rejected any attempts at an agreed-upon theology and allowed each individual to
find God in his or her own way. Some emphasized intuition; others focused on the advances of science.
For
the next few years, efforts were made by the National
Conference to bring members of the Free Religious Association back into the
fold. However, all attempts were unsuccessful, as either the
concessions weren't conciliatory enough for the free religion
movement or were too radical for the Christians. Tension
between the two groups remained strong, because many active
members of the FRA continued to occupy Unitarian pulpits and
attend Unitarian services. A controversy arose in 1873, when
the names of ministers associated with the FRA began to be
removed from the list of ministers in the Year Book of the
American Unitarian Association. After a huge backlash, it was
decided that no name should be removed unless the minister
requested it or he had officially left the denomination.
The
Free Religious Association eventually fizzled out, but some of its
members would go on to be notable philosophers of the period,
and their word had an impact on their former associates in the
Unitarian churches. During the 1880's, the
controversy resurfaced within the Western Unitarian
Conference,
albeit in a slightly different form. While still emphasizing
universal theism, a significant humanist element also began
forming, which set aside the concept of "God" and
focused instead on ethics. The influence of the earlier free religion movement could be clearly seen
by the decision in 1882 to accept the motto "Freedom,
Fellowship, and Character in Religion" for the WUC, which is
remarkably similar to the motto of the Free Religious
Association ("Freedom and Fellowship in Religion").
Leaders of the movement in the West were Jenkin Lloyd Jones
and William Channing Gannett, whose views were reflected in
their journal, Unity, and those in sympathy with them were
dubbed "Unity men." Their influence greatly
concerned the Christians, and Jabez T. Sunderland, the
secretary of the WUC, published a pamphlet in 1886 entitled, The
Issue in the West, in which he voiced his apprehension
about the state of affairs: "This new Unitarianism has
shown an especially warm sympathy with the Free Religious
movement, and later, with the Ethical movement, has steadily
sought to differentiate itself from the Unitarianism of the
East as being something 'broader' and 'more advanced' than
that, has long been averse to the use of the Christian name,
and for a few years past has been more and more distinctly
moving off from even a theistic basis, until now it declares
openly and strongly that even belief in God must no longer be
declared an essential of Unitarianism....Unitarianism must
stand for ethical beliefs and beliefs in certain so-called
'principles,' but not for beliefs in anything that will commit
it to theism or Christianity."
Despite
Sunderland's
objections, the Unity
movement remained strong, and at the annual meeting of the WUC that
year, by a vote of 34 to 10, a resolution was adopted,
composed by William Channing Gannett, which stated, "The
Western Unitarian Conference conditions its fellowship on no
dogmatic tests, but welcomes all who wish to join it to
establish truth, righteousness, and love in the world."
Many
of the more conservative churches in the conference were
unhappy with the direction in which the conference was headed
and withdrew from fellowship. At the next meeting in 1887, an
attempt was made at reconciliation, and Gannett composed an
additional declaration, "Things Commonly Believed Among
Us," a portion of which can be seen at the sidebar to the
left. This statement did not satisfy the conservatives, and
the controversy raged for a few more years.
Finally,
at the annual meeting of the National Conference in 1894, all
parties agreed to the adoption of a new preamble to the
constitution, which stated, "The Conference recognizes
the fact that its constituency is Congregational in tradition
and polity. Therefore, it declares that nothing in this
constitution is to be construed as an authoritative test; and
we cordially invite to our working fellowship any who, while
differing from us in belief, are in general sympathy with our
spirit and our practical aims." This statement set the
stage for what was to come.
The
AUC supports religious freedom. It understands
that there are different yet legitimate paths to God and recognizes
that other faith traditions, beliefs, philosophies, and
religious texts emphasize love for God and
for humanity. The AUC has created a set of religious principles
that allow for other monotheistic conceptions of God outside
of the Christian tradition, and non-Christian churches, fellowships,
and individuals are members. In this
respect it embraces the free religion movement. However,
although the
AUC believes that absolute freedom of religion is a right
that should be guaranteed by the state and society, it does
not believe that absolute freedom of religion can be itself a
religion. There is something oxymoronic in the idea of a
pluralistic religion. A religious
organization is a group of people practicing a distinct
religion, not a group of people from different religions doing
something else other than practicing a distinct religion. James Freeman
Clarke once said that
"Free Religion sacrifices the motive power derived from
association and religious sympathy for the sake of a larger
intellectual freedom." This
is the trap that the free religious movement fell into, and
the result is that the distinct religion of Unitarianism has
become diluted and for all practical purposes, lost.
The
AUC intends to promote Unitarianism as the distinct religion
that it once was. It maintains a distinct faith
tradition, monotheistic, and rooted in the Western tradition. This does not mean
that the AUC will strictly define concepts of God and other
religious issues; nor does it mean it will reject
religious groups or individuals that are not part of the
Conference.
Being open to other interpretations and
understandings of God is part of the AUC's hallmark. However, the AUC
is an institution that will promote and teach within the
Unitarian tradition and honor the Unitarian Christian
foundations of that tradition. The very core of that tradition
is faith in one God.
The
free religion movement proved to be a double-edged sword for
the Unitarian churches and associations. While, on the one hand, it forced
Unitarianism to live up to its own principles regarding freedom of
religion and creedlessness, at the same time it opened the way for philosophies
completely opposed to the principles of Unitarianism. To hold
that all religious opinions are equally meritorious is, in the
final analysis, to be indifferent to religion and to despair
that one can achieve any degree of religious understanding.
The AUC does not accept the proposition that the Unitarian faith can
coherently stand for the proposition that God exists (our
belief) and the proposition that God does not exist (the
atheist "humanist" proposition). We also do not
accept the proposition that the Unitarian faith can coherently
stand for the proposition that there is one God (our belief)
and the proposition that there is more than one God (the
polytheistic and, often, pagan belief). One or the other
sides of these questions is true. Logically, it is
either true that God exists or does not exist. How can
there be a middle ground on that question? And logically,
there is one God or more than one God. Both propositions
cannot be true. On an issue so central to religion, how can a
religion profitably fail to hold an opinion on the
issue of whether God exists or treat the question as merely a
matter of taste (like whether one prefers strawberry or
vanilla ice cream)? We at the AUC believe in God and
that there is one God. On this we are united. Ours is a
faith to which God is central. On that we agree with
most Unitarians in the past and with most Unitarians elsewhere
in the world. It is the business of religion to explore our
faith in God and its implications for how we should lead our
lives.
It
may be noted that if a fellowship or church decides to
organize itself around the AUC's Seven Principles (printed on
our main page) and to go no further in defining its theology
or limiting it, it will very much resemble the faith of the
early free religionists. It would espouse a universal or
scientific theism, or a deism in the spirit of Thomas Paine
and Ethan Allen. Such fellowships and churches are welcome as
members of the AUC. They fall under our umbrella and still
hold much in common with classical Unitarianism.
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