ning with the Transcendentalists, Unitarians began to find truth in religions other than Christianity. Emerson, for example, studied the Bhagavad-Gita, a Hindu scripture. In 1893, Jenkin Lloyd Jones, a prominent Midwestern Unitarian leader, brought the Parliament of World Religions to Chicago, hosting participants from a breadth of religious backgrounds to share their thinking. By that time, Universalists, too, had begun broadening the concept of Universalism beyond the idea of universal salvation to embrace what is universal in human experience.
[Ask participants, "Can you see ways that openness to different expressions of religion has shaped Unitarian Universalism?"]
With revelation not limited to biblical sources or the authority of (mostly male) clergy, women claimed their place in our religious tradition. Thus, Unitarians and Universalists became early supporters of women's rights, including suffrage, the ordination of women, and the economic independence of women from their fathers and husbands.
[Ask participants how they see the movement for women's rights reflected in Unitarian Universalism.]
Around the same time, many Christians were shaken by scientific ideas. Charles Darwin proposed his theory of evolution. Unitarians and Universalists had already realized that science, too, was a source of truth, so had little difficulty with Darwin's ideas. Even harder than Darwin's theory for many orthodox Christians to accept was the 19th-century movement of historical-literary criticism of the Bible, which examined biblical texts as products of a particular time and place. Again, Unitarians and Universalists had no problem with such ideas, because they embraced the ever-widening sphere of truth from a variety of sources.
[Invite participants to consider other forms of revelation that may have added to the richness of Unitarian Universalism. Participants may remember something from Workshop 1 regarding the Sources.]
The Power of Nature
With science as an esteemed source of truth rather than the source of an inconvenient conflict with religion, the Transcendentalist movement, an outgrowth of Unitarianism began to look to nature for life lessons. Ralph Waldo Emerson's essay "Nature" inspired Unitarians to see not only the authority of the natural world, but also to understand humanity, or human nature, as something that was part of the natural order. These Transcendentalist ideals inspired later humanists, as well as mystics and theists.
Once feminists discovered goddess imagery in the 1970s, Pagans began to find a place in Unitarian Universalism. "Spiritual teachings of Earth-centered traditions... " was added to the Sources in 1995. These theological commitments to the Earth and Nature—from Transcendentalism to Paganism—have been played out through environmental activism in Unitarian Universalist congregations since the 1970s.
[Ask, "Have you noticed any focus on Nature or environmental concerns in this congregation?"]
Building the Beloved Community
Both Unitarians and Universalists have focused on this world, rather than the next. Their "this-world" orientation has often moved them to the leading edge of social change.
[Ask: Can you think of examples of this from your experience, or from ideas we have already explored in this workshop?]
Examples of Unitarian and Universalist work to build a Beloved Community include:
- Universalists issued a statement against slavery in 1790.
- Many active 19th-century abolitionists were Unitarian or Universalist.
- Unitarians, especially Henry Whitney Bellows, were among the founders of the U.S. Sanitary Commission, which improved conditions for soldiers in the Civil War.
- Universalists were the first religious body to ordain a woman, Olympia Brown, in 1863.
- Unitarians and Universalists, from Horace Mann to the Transcendentalists to Angus MacLean and Sophia Lyon Fahs, championed progressive education.
- The 20th century saw Unitarians active with the NAACP, including John Haynes Holmes (an early member) and A. Powell Davies.
- Many Unitarians and Universalists have been pacifists, inc