American Univeralist History

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American Univeralist History
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American Universalist History
John Murray, Father of Univeralism

• Give them not hell but hope
• 1741-1815, founder of the Universalist
  denomination in America, b. England. He was
  excommunicated by the Methodists after he had
  openly accepted Universalism as taught by James
  Relly. Murray emigrated to America in 1770 where,
  after traveling as a Universalist preacher for
  four years in New Jersey, New York, and New
  England, he settled in Gloucester, Mass. He
  continued his preaching there and in nearby
  centers. In 1775, General Washington announced
  Murray's appointment as chaplain to the Rhode
  Island troops. He served as pastor of the newly
  organized Independent Church of Christ (1779) at
  Gloucester until he was called to the pastorate
  of the Universalist Society of Boston in 1793.

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American Universalist History
Theology of John Murray

• From his activity in disseminating his
  opinions he is styled the "father of Universalism
  in America," but his doctrines differed
  essentially from those that are now recognized by
  that denomination. He accepted the doctrine of
  the Trinity, and believed in God as one
  "indivisible first cause," in a personal devil,
  and orders of angels. His fundamental doctrine as
  a Universalist was that Christ literally put away
  the sin of the whole world, but he distinguished
  between universal salvation and universal
  redemption by fixing degrees of punishment that
  were to be inflicted before the final judgment,
  after which all the world, he believed, would be
  saved.

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American Universalist History
Judith Sargent Murray

• Judith Sargent Murray was remarkable woman,
  socially ambitious yet at the same time an ardent
  advocate of womens rights. She was a prolific
  writer of poetry, drama, and essays, some of the
  written under pseudonyms to allow her greater
  freedom of expression. Her essays on the
  equality of the sexes anticipated most of the
  arguments put forth by the nascent womens
  movement half century later. She would be
  pleased to know that she was to find her place in
  history as Americas first leading feminist.

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American Universalist History
Other Early Universalist Leaders

• George de Benneville had come to America from
  Europe (England) in 1741 to escape persecution,
  once having almost been beheaded for his
  universalist convictions. On arriving in
  America, he settled near Philadelphia, in an area
  where many of the inhabitants already believed in
  universal salvation, convinced that a loving God
  would never condemn any of his children to
  eternal damnation.
• Elhanan Winchester came to Universalism from the
  Baptist ranks. Winchester shared his pulpit in
  Philadelphia with Dr. Joseph Priestley. Among
  the supporters of Winchester was Dr. Benjamin
  Rush, one of the signers of the Declaration of
  Independence.
• Liberal New England Congregationalists
• Jonathan Mayhew whose brilliant career and
  revolutionary agitator was cut short by an
  untimely death, attempted to persuade his
  congregation at West Church in Boston that God,
  being an eminently reasonable being, could not
  act in a manner less ethical and fair than a
  leading citizen of Boston by condemning men to
  everlasting woe.
• Charles Chauncy made large contributions to
  Universalist thought within Congregationalism.
  He was the persistent champion of the role of
  reason in religion.

Elhanan Winchester
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American Universalist History
The Winchester Profession, 1803

• Article the First. We believe that the Holy
  Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments contain
  a revelation of the character of God, and of the
  duty, interest and final destination of mankind.
• Article the Second. We believe that there is one
  God, whose nature is Love, revealed in on Lord
  Jesus Christ, by one Holy Spirit of Grace, who
  will finally restore the whole family of mankind
  to holiness and happiness.
• Article the Third. We believe that holiness and
  true happiness are inseparably connected, and
  that believers ought to be careful to maintain
  order, and practice good works for those things
  are good and profitable to men.
• The following was appended to the Profession
• Yet while we adopt a general Profession of
  Belief we leave it to the several Churches and
  Societies, or to smaller associations of churches
  to continue or adopt within themselves, such
  more particular articles of faith as may appear
  to them best under their particular
  circumstances, provide they do not disagree with
  our general Profession .
• The last statement was know as the Liberty
  Clause.

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American Universalist History
Hosea Ballou, theologian of Universalism

• Ordained in an unusual way At a Universalist
  convention in 1794, Elhanan Winchester on
  reaching the climax of his sermon at the
  concluding service, suddenly pressed a Bible
  against the surprised Ballous chest and ordered
  him charged on the spot! (Later, in 1803, to make
  sure that the legality of the weddings at which
  he officiated would not be challenged, Ballou was
  reordained by the New England Convention in a
  more formal manner.
• In 1805 Hosea Ballou published A Treatise on
  Atonement. It was the most original and
  influential statement of nineteenth-century
  Universalist theology.

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American Universalist History
The Treatise on Atonement

• The treatise is divided into three parts (1)
  Sin, (2) the Atonement for Sin, (3) the
  consequences of Atonement for Mankind
• The treatise states, Sin, in its nature, ought
  to be considered finite and limited, rather than
  infinite and unlimited, as has, by many been
  supposed.
• God, argues Ballou, is in a sense the author of
  sin, since, being almighty, God would not allow
  it to exist unless it served some useful purpose.
• Mans main object, he writes, in all he does,
  is happiness. What would induce men to form
  societies to be at the expense of supporting
  governments to acquire knowledge to learn the
  sciences, or till the earth, if they believed the
  could be as happy without as with? The problem,
  then, is deciding what actions do in fact lead to
  true happiness rather than to sinfulness.

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American Universalist History
The Treatise on Atonement (continued)

• Ballou openly ridicules the doctrine of the
  Trinity.
• Ballou affirms the Unitarian (or Arian) position
  that Christ is not part of the Godhead but rather
  a lesser created being.
• Rather than coming to appease Gods anger, Christ
  came to the world to demonstrate the power of
  love through which men and women can turn away
  from sin and be reconciled to God.
• As for the meaning of the crucifixion, Ballou has
  this to say The literal death of the man,
  Christ Jesus, is figurative. The literal body of
  Jesus represented the whole letter of the law.
  The death of Jesus represented the death and
  destruction of the letter, when the spirit comes
  forth, bursting the veil thereof, which is
  represented by the resurrection of Jesus from the
  dead.
• Near the end of his treatise, Ballou pleads with
  his fellow Universalists for tolerance and
  open-mindedness. Be cautious of any system of
  divinity, he warns. The moment we fancy
  ourselves infallible, every one must come to our
  peculiarities or we cast them away.

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American Universalist History
Women Begin Preaching

• The first Universalist woman to brave public
  opinion and preach her faith was Marian Cook, who
  delivered a sermon to a meeting of the Western
  Association in Bainbridge, New York, in 1811.
• It wasnt until the national womens rights
  movement began to gain strength that the
  Univeralist pulpits really opened up to women.
  Lydia A. Jenkins, wife of a Universalist
  clergyman commenced preaching to good acceptance.
  However, whether Jenkins actually ever received
  ordination is not clear, but she served with her
  husband in what can best be described as a
  successful parish co-ministry.

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American Universalist History
Women Become Ordained Ministers

• In 1863, Olympia Brown was the first woman
  minister in America to ordained with full
  denominational authority. Olympia Brown dedicated
  her life to opening doors for women. Among only a
  handful of women to graduate from college, she
  received her Bachelor of Arts degree from Antioch
  in 1860 and three years later became the first
  woman graduate of a regularly established
  theological school at St. Lawrence University.
  She was ordained a Universalist minister, the
  first woman to achieve full ministerial standing
  recognized by a denomination. As a young
  minister, she took an active role in the women's
  suffrage movement and was one of the few original
  suffragists who lived to vote in the 1920
  presidential election.
• Entering divinity school in 1861, she
  completed her course of study in 1863. She had to
  convince those opposed to women in the ministry
  that they could complete the required course of
  study as commendably as she had. Then she had to
  convince the reluctant ministers to ordain her
  and allow her to be called to the parish
  ministry. Despite considerable opposition, Brown
  prevailed in both goals. This determination
  characterized her throughout her long and
  fruitful life.

Olympia Brown
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American Universalist History
Women Become Ordained Ministers

• Augusta Jane Chapin, Universalist
  minister and educator, was one of the earliest
  women to be ordained in ministry. She was the
  first woman to sit on the Council of the General
  Convention of Universalists. She was also a
  groundbreaker for women seeking higher education
  and advanced degrees.
• In 1859 Chapin preached her first sermon at
  Portland, Michigan. She preached for three years
  instead of the customary one year before applying
  for a Letter of Fellowship. This was granted in
  1862 by the Michigan Convention of Universalists.
  In December 1863 she was ordained to the
  Universalist ministry at Lansing, Michigan. She
  joined a very small group of American women in
  ministry which included Lucretia Mott (Quaker),
  Antoinette Brown (Congregational, later
  Unitarian), Lydia Jenkins (Universalist) and
  Olympia Brown (Universalist, ordained earlier
  that year).
• In 1868 Lombard University (later College)
  of Galesburg, Illinois, a co-educational
  Universalist school, granted Chapin an honorary
  Master of Arts degree. She served Lombard as
  non-resident lecturer in English literature,
  1885-97, and as non-resident lecturer on art,
  1892-1897. In 1893 Lombard conferred on her the
  first Doctor of Divinity degree ever awarded to a
  woman in America.

Augusta Jane Chapin
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American Universalist History

• Joseph Jordan, the first African American
  to be ordained as a minister by the Universalist
  denomination, founded the First Universalist
  Church of Norfolk, Virginia in 1887 and initiated
  an educational effort for African American
  children in Norfolk and vicinity. The missions
  and schools that were his legacy served thousands
  of children and families in eastern Virginia over
  the period of a century.
• Jordan several times changed
  occupationsbecoming a laborer, a grocer, and
  finally a carpenter. As a carpenter he earned
  enough money to buy or build several houses in
  the Norfolk suburb of Huntersville. He was then
  able to live off the rent. Literate, skilled, and
  a property owner, Jordan was among the elite of
  his race and poised to become a leader in his
  community.
• He established the Suffolk (VA) mission and
  stayed there until his death. After his death,
  the church ceased to function, but the school
  continued under the leadership of his daughter
  Annie B. Willis.

Joseph Jordan
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American Universalist History

• Education Graduated from the theological
  school, St. Lawrence University, 1870. In 1891 he
  took upon himself the role of independent
  Universalist missionary, raising his own
  financial support as he went until designated
  general missionary by the Universalist Convention
  in 1895. Shinn was remarkable in his ability to
  sow the seeds of Universalist congregations. He
  traveled twenty-five thousand to thirty thousand
  miles a year and preached in every state,
  reporting that by 1895 he had started 1 "about
  fifty" churches and the same number of Sunday
  schools. He would typically come to a town where
  there were few or no Universalists, hire a hall,
  leaflet the town, and begin to preach,
  encouraging each of his hearers to bring others
  the next day. He tried to leave the town with
  some organization -- a church, youth group,
  Sunday school, or Ladies' Aid Society. Although
  some of these groups were short-lived, others
  were not, and Shinn's efforts helped to spread
  Universalism beyond its New England roots
• Shinn loved his difficult and strenuous
  work, and it could indeed be said that he took
  the whole nation for his parish.

Quillen Shinn
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American Universalist History

• Clarence R. Skinner (1881-1949),
  minister, teacher, writer and social activist, is
  widely regarded as the most influential
  Universalist of the first half of the twentieth
  century. He was born in Brooklyn into a
  thoroughly Universalist family-his parents and
  brothers were Universalists a grandfather, great
  grandfather and great uncle were Universalist
  ministers. He attended St. Lawrence, a
  Universalist university, where he met and later
  married a Universalist classmate and fellow Phi
  Beta Kappa, Clara Louise Ayres.
• Skinner became Dean of Tufts Universitys
  Crane Theological School and co-founder of the
  non-denominational Community Church of Boston.
  Services throughout Skinner's leadership were
  held in a series of rented halls, with attendance
  rising to over 1,200. The church was deeply
  involved in many social causes, aid to the
  Republican government of Spain, and the right of
  Margaret Sanger to publicly advocate birth
  control. Clarence Russell Skinner was a prophet
  of the social gospel.