What Do Universalists Believe?

January 8, 1961
Rochester

What Do Universalists Believe?

In both routine and unusual situations the Universalist minister and Universalist layman can expect that when the subject of religion is raised, and our identity known, someone will ask, “What do Universalists believe?” Sometimes it is an inquirer who, dissatisfied with old ways, is seeking a new faith. On other occasions, perhaps a long time Universalist, disturbed by the convictions of other Universalists, will ask the question with some doubt of the qualifications of a Universalist who cherishes other beliefs than the old and beloved doctrine of the “final harmony of all souls with God.” Then, too, parents, seeking a free and reasonable religious education for their children, will make the inquiry.

The question recurs again and again, and when a person is angry with a minister, church school teacher or visiting preacher, most answers will fail to either satisfy or persuade.

Others will assert that if we could provide a plain and positive answer to the question “What do Universalists believe?” we would solve all our problems of small church schools and sparsely attended worship; we would ensure financial expansion; misunderstandings among the congregation would no longer ripple the placid surface of our fellowship; and, most of all, we would pacify the gnawing pain of our religious insecurity. While we Universalists are willing to concede the value of religious freedom, we are sometimes troubled by the consequences of liberty of thought and interpretation. We wonder, do we not, if assurance to soothe our doubts is not more vital than the uncertainties of freedom?

I would propose to you that “What do Universalists believe?” is the wrong question from which to expect a right answer. The clue to the significance of modern Universalism will be found when the question is asked, “How do Universalists arrive at their beliefs?”

Parenthetically, let me attempt to assert in a paragraph what I believe as a Universalist. From where I stand, one can assume rightfully that a Universalist accepts the body of tested truth accumulated and continuously refined by the geologist, biologist, astronomer, physicist, social scientist and by members of all other authentic learned professions. The Universalist follows reason as a guide and validates propositions by experience and experiment. The Universalist places freedom and the supreme worth of every human personality at the top of his scale of values and willingly serves causes in consistency with these principles which advance the human family. The Universalist looks hopefully on the nature and destiny of man. More than that, some of us are willing to abide in the conviction that beyond the limits of our power and comprehension there is an organizing principle, eternally creating, in whom we place our ultimate trust – a good God.

It is of the nature and application of these propositions that my preaching ministry will elaborate. But, many of you will say, “well, that’s not exactly what I believe,” and such disagreement is a right treasured in the Universalist Church.

We have an obligation to remember that creeds, doctrinal statements and avowals of faith are interpretations about which men have never agreed fully, or for long, not only in the general history of religion, but also among Universalists, both historically and currently. Thus we return to the proper question which provides an avenue of understanding, “How do people arrive at religious beliefs?”

Custom and tradition are of seminal importance in what people believe. The family heritage of faith will always play a strong directing role in belief. The person who never is stimulated to examine the claims and purpose of his family or national religion will continue to be a believer, sometimes passionate, sometimes nominal.

That tradition or custom is usually based on a central authority – a Bible, an hierarchy or a person.

We know how many Christians avow that the inspiration and revelation of Scripture is what they believe. One book suffices.

Jessica Mitford, whose story of her own eccentric English family, DAUGHTERS AND REBELS, is credited with an anecdote about her picturesque father. She said, “Father had an enormous library. It had come down through our family for generations. But he never read a book! I asked him about this one time, and he confessed that he had read WHITE FANG by Jack London.

“‘Good book,’ he said, ‘Enjoyed it. Don’t see any point in reading another.’”

Some people affirm religious beliefs similarly. Believing the Bible, a good many of them have not even read it once, but they see no point in reading anything else – at least for religious guidance.

Other persons believe that truth is revealed authoritatively by a holy church, which is the repository of true faith, supernaturally entrusted with the guidance of the faithful. A believer accepts what the Church asserts is religious truth. If the facts contradict the teachings of the church then so much the worse for the facts. For such believers faith is unqualified acceptance of the propositions an institution pronounces as correct belief.

Still others may deposit their religious trust in a special person who is believed to possess a unique channel of communication or power leading directly to God. Thus Joseph Smith acquired thousands of followers who believed his Book of Mormon to be God’s will and words.

But the revealed book, the authoritative hierarchy and the sacred person just do not fulfill our requirements for religious belief, for these authorities do not fit into the methods by which we arrive at our beliefs.

In committing ourselves to belief, we place our trust in experience. Do the notions match the facts? Does the religious faith square with our human experiences? Is the faith reasonable? Helpful? Supporting? Hopeful? Will it stand the rigors of hard times and never ending tests occasioned by new discoveries of truths?

In decisions involving belief, Universalists should not cut off the power of critical thinking. Consider the airplanes in the sky, the efficient inner loop with its geometric clover leafs and engineered grades, the magic of the chemist’s brew and the shining strength of metallurgist's products, the modern hospital where science and skill are invested with great humanitarian motives. These achievements are unthinkable without intelligence guided by critical thought.

Some years ago the late professor John Erskine, then famous as professor of literature, published an essay I have never entirely forgotten, entitled “The Obligation to be Intelligent.” With provocative wit, he wrote of the need to combine intelligence with other desirable qualities of life. Using as a text Kingsley’s lines, “Be good sweet maid and let who will be clever,” he criticized an all too common attitude that somehow there is a diversion between goodness and intelligence. In his words, “stupidity is regarded as first cousin to moral conduct and cleverness as the first step into mischief; that reason and God are not on good terms with each other; that the mind and heart are rival buckets in the well of truth, inexorably balanced: full time, starved heart – stout heart, weak head.”

The application of intelligence to religion is just as necessary. Can a religion fit our time be anything but a thoughtful religion? Should not religion make sense? Because Universalism values the thought processes, it merits consideration from thoughtful people.

When one begins with a foundation of freedom and uses critical thoughts as a power tool, to be sure there will be occasional discomfort, even shock. Whitehead once commented that adventure is the key to civilization and that the highest point of the adventure is that strong feeling is discontent with things as they [are], as man applies his mind to make things for the better.

When Universalists arrive at belief through freedom, disciplined by critical thinking there are consequences of revolutionary force. These consequences are just beginning to be made known to us, but their development will become more and more apparent as we persist on the difficult, but provocative assignment of building on freedom with reason.

First, the way in which we arrive out our beliefs indicates an end to exclusion. Henceforth we will find it difficult to put up barriers which would make our church an exclusive elite. When we gladly concede the worth of all persons, which is both implicit in the principle of freedom and explicit in our charter of faith which imposes no creedal tests, we are also saying that the genius of our Universalism is its inclusiveness. We include all; shut no one out for any cause, color or condition. Now, universal salvation means that we seek the truest and best life, for each and everyone and recognize all forms of discrimination as ills to be overcome, not distinctions to be cherished.

Our forebears in the faith withstood calumny and scandal to proclaim their grand faith in the salvation of all souls in eternity. In our time the natural restatement of that grand faith is our proclamation of the inclusion of all persons in the area of the good life here and now.

The second consequence of our method of achieving belief is that the unity we seek must be acquired amid diversity of opinion. In his Meditations, Marcus Aurelius once said, “from Apollonius I learned that a man can be both resolute and yielding.” This paradoxical statement is a wise hint to Universalists who may sometimes be aggravated by the contrary beliefs of a fellow Universalist.

“A man can be most resolute and yielding.” We can be resolute in our assurance of the convictions we have hammered out on the anvils of our experience. We need neither hide nor distort our individual interpretation of the facts of religion to accommodate the sensitivity of a fellow Universalist. Similarly, he may be equally honest and forthright in his expressions. We are resolute in asserting our conviction. We yield to each other in granting, in all good will, the same privilege. Not only can this provide unity amid diversity, but also in all exchanges in good will, our individual differences will be refined. Inevitably, we will all be drawn closer together in the bonds of human fellowship.

The third consequence of our method of arriving at belief is that we assert willingness to abide in the principle of growth. Because freedom, reason and fellowship are basic we have the motivation to find better ways of religious expression and more useful opportunities for service when we find that the old-time religion isn’t good enough for us.

One of the legends surrounding the history of Daniel Boone is that once when the nearest new neighbor had built a cabin nine miles away, Boone marched deeper into the wilderness. He said he couldn’t stand crowds and had to have elbow room. So, at the age of 65, he traveled toward the setting sun and marked a new edge on the western frontier. Commenting on this, someone said once that for many Universalists the sermons of John Murray and William Ellery Channing marked the extreme frontier of liberal thought. In the Deuteronomic account of the exodus from Egypt (2/3), when the tribes of Israel were making their long trek from bondage to freedom, they stopped many days at the mountain. Then the voice of Jehovah came to them saying, “Ye have compassed this mountain long enough. Turn northward.”

Our universe is changing, dynamic and if thee is any obvious characteristic it is that both change and growth are ineradicable rhythms. A religion willing to change and grow is but getting in tune with universal experience, cosmic as well as human.

In James Michener’s massive novel, HAWAII, one of the more prominent of an exhausting parade of characters is Hoxworth Hale. As a young college student, Hoxworth Hale is labeled a radical, primarily because he challenged the mistaken lectures of a professor. In his self-analysis amid his troubles, Hoxworth Hale applies all the powers of his mind to defining the right and wrong among his positions. Then the novelist comments, “thus he started his education, that marvelous, growing, aching process whereby a mind develops into a usable instrument with a collection of proved experience from which to function.”

Universalism must function as a usable instrument bound by proved experience.

Thus the manner in which we arrive at our beliefs charts the unity we seek by principle, not by prescription, no matter how pious or soothing any ancient formula may be. We hold the foundation of freedom and the unifying power of service to be the great values. In them there is constructed the inclusiveness of all persons, the worth of each individual and the determination that the abundant life shall be the privilege of an ever-increasing number of persons. These values we celebrate in worship and discussion in song and seminar, in communion and conversation.

Years ago, John Murray Atwood said something like this, as he defended the freedom basis for Universalism: “Not that a man may do as he pleases, but that he may able to be true to the vision he has gained on the Sinai he has been able to climb.”

Belief is many things, but [for our religion to be real, it is, of necessity, difficult], for in asserting freedom, one assumes the heavy labor of fashioning and strengthening one’s own faith based on inward convictions. In no lesser degree one assumes the obligation. So respecting the full measure of human dignity is the right of every other person, that one not only accepts with grace differing convictions but defends as primary principles of faith the right to differ and the responsibility to nurture a growing faith.