Roots Hold Me Close:
William Ellery Channing and the Baltimore Sermon

Rev. Peter Friedrichs

November 4, 2007

In one of the most beloved hymns in our Unitarian Universalist churches we sing the words "roots hold me close, wings set me free." These words remind us that we are a faith that is at once steeped in tradition and history while it also continues to evolve and move forward. As Unitarian Universalists we tend to focus on our wings. The things that lift us up and inspire us. The things that move us forward into the future. The things that motivate us to serve as agents of change in our community. The things that set us free. But it is good to be reminded from time to time that we are a faith grounded deeply in history, that our roots run deep. Our ever-evolving theology leads some to characterize Unitarian Universalism as a "new-age" phenomenon, and the consolidation of the Unitarians and the Universalists less than fifty years ago admittedly lends a youthful appearance to our movement. Yet we can trace the foundations of our faith back some 500 years, and there is strong evidence that some of the earliest Christians were both Unitarian and Universalist in their beliefs. So today I'd like to spend some time looking at one particular moment in the history of our faith, and one particular religious leader who courageously defended and promoted a liberal theology in the face of a hostile establishment. This is the first of what I'm calling a "sometimes sermon series" where we'll learn about those important men and women to whom we are bound and on whose shoulders we stand today. Today, our focus is on the Unitarian minister William Ellery Channing and the address he delivered in 1819 on the occasion of the ordination of Jared Sparks, which is referred to as the "Baltimore Sermon."

First, a bit of context. The first thirty years of the nineteenth century, when America was still in the throes of its new-found independence from England, were tumultuous times for the congregational churches of New England. Calvinism was the dominant theology of the day, a doctrine that held that human beings were born as sinful creatures who, despite their best efforts and intentions, were unable to escape that condition except through the grace of God. In this view, all people are born in complete depravity and are entirely at the mercy of God, who would be justified in condemning all people for their sins, but who has chosen to be merciful to some. According to Calvin's "Doctrine of the Elect," one person is saved while another is condemned, not because of any act, belief or virtue, but because God has chosen to have mercy on him. Because God is omniscient, God knows from the day you are born whether or not you will gain the kingdom when you die, or whether you will be eternally condemned to the fires of hell. Even the death of Christ on the cross was insufficient to atone for your sins unless you were a member of the "Elect." This was the prevailing theology of the day in American churches. These so-called "orthodox" churches of the time were also strongly Trinitarian in their view of God, consistent with the Council of Nicaea's determination that God is one being manifest in three persons: the father, the son and the holy ghost.

This theology, however, began meeting some resistance in the churches of New England in the late 18th and early 18th centuries. Freedom, responsibility and rationalism were concepts expressed not just in the statehouses and the courts of our young nation, but they were finding their way into our churches as well. As Conrad Wright wrote in his book A Stream of Light, "More than a few earnest Christians were concerned that the Calvinistic system of salvation was on the one hand far too complex, while on the other it placed too little emphasis on the importance of personal responsibility for the conduct of a moral life."^[1] While the dawn of the nineteenth century witnessed an uneasy accommodation of liberal views in churches of the Standing Order, it was not to last. In 1804, Harvard Divinity School named the liberal Henry Ware to the Hollis Chair, the oldest endowed chair in America, signaling a distinct shift away from the Calvinist control of the influential institution. This event was the spark that lit the fuse for the debate that was to follow, and that led to the establishment of Unitarian churches throughout New England. Soon, we would find conservative, Trinitarian ministers refusing to share their pulpits with their liberal brethren, and congregations literally torn apart, with either the liberal or the conservative faction splitting off and forming a new church across the town common or, in some cases, right next door. In one famous case, a lawsuit was brought to determine whether the church's communion silver should stay with the liberals or move with the affronted conservatives. (The liberals won the fight and kept the silver.) The debate spilled out into the press, where pamphlets written by conservative ministers attacked the heresies of their Unitarian counterparts, and the liberal ministers responded in kind. This, then, was the theological and ecclesiastical stew that was bubbling when William Ellery Channing assumed the helm of the Federal Street Church in Boston in 1803, where he was to serve as senior minister for nearly 40 years.

Channing was born to a wealthy Rhode Island family whose members included professors, physicians, lawyers, and a signer of the Declaration of Independence. Channing's family gave him a broad exposure to the religious movements of the day, ranging from the Rhode Island Baptists to revivalist itinerant preachers. He attended Harvard College and later the Divinity School, where his liberal leanings were revealed. In one paper he wrote: "It is always best to think first for ourselves on any subject, and then to have recourse to others for the correction or improvement of our own sentiments. . . . The quantity of knowledge thus gained may be less, but the quality will be superior. Truth received on authority, or acquired without labor, makes but a feeble impression."^[2] He watched, largely from the sidelines, as what we now call the "Unitarian Controversy" warmed from a simmer to a boil.

But in 1815, after witnessing the heated exchange of pamphlets trading epithets and accusations between a conservative minister and his liberal counterpart, Channing entered the fray with a pamphlet of his own. In it, he took the position that the subtleties of the Trinitarian teachings about the triune nature of God did little to inspire men and women to live a Christian life. Notwithstanding this jibe, Channing advocated healing the rift between the so-called orthodox ministers and their liberal counterparts for the sake of the church and its people. He did not relish a schism within the Congregational churches of New England. Rather, he sought a full and open debate of the content and meaning of the New Testament so as to reach a new and shared understanding about God and his son Jesus. The Trinitarians, however, dug in their heels. Dr. Samuel Worcester, a conservative minister in Salem, Massachusetts, launched a rebuttal of Channing's pamphlet, claiming that Trinitarian Christianity was "the only and necessary way to salvation," and that "the errors of the Unitarians" were undermining Christianity.

The debate that raged between the orthodox and liberal ministers was fought largely on the terms of the conservative Trinitarians. It was they who took the fight to their heretical brethren, and the liberals were constantly on the defensive. Until May 5, 1819. That was the day that Channing delivered what some have called "The Unitarian Manifesto" before a packed church, on the occasion of the ordination of Channing's mentor, Jared Sparks, to the ministry. My colleague Rev. Victoria Weinstein has said that "this was definitely a calculated strike on behalf of the liberals. They weren't going into this with typical expectations; this was gonna be Big Time Statement by one of their superstars. And so it was." Liberal luminaries from Boston trekked 400 miles to Baltimore to hear Channing's address, including none other than Henry Ware, whose appointment to Harvard had sparked the controversy in the first place. Now, back then, ministers knew how to Preach, with a capital "P", and Channing's Baltimore Sermon, which he titled simply "Unitarian Christianity," ran for some 20,000 words, and it took him nearly two hours to deliver. I think I'll try to sum it up for you in something less than that.

Channing opened his sermon by advocating what was then a radical approach to interpreting the Bible. Contrary to the prevailing conservative literalism, Channing declared that the meaning of the Bible "is to be sought in the same manner as that of other books." By this, he explained, the words of the Bible must be interpreted in light of human experience and human reason. This may not sound like such a radical statement to our postmodern ears, but believe me when I say that this statement cut to the very heart of the conservative Christian tradition. And, just as an aside, I'll point out that it still would today. Channing warned against the practice of "proof-texting," or finding isolated passages in Scripture to support one's position, and urged that the Bible should be interpreted as a whole, passages being dependent upon each other for their meaning and significance. And, perhaps most radically, Channing advocated that the teachings of the Bible must be harmonized and cohered with what he called "the obvious and acknowledged laws of nature." Can you imagine such blasphemy? And he was just getting warmed up.

From here Channing launched into his interpretation of the Bible as it related to the nature of God, the nature of Jesus and the nature of true Christianity. Taking aim directly at his Trinitarian accusers, he wrote: "We do then, with all earnestness, though without reproaching our brethren, protest against the irrational and unscriptural doctrine of the Trinity… We understand that there is one being, one mind, one person…" This, of course, goes to the heart of the relationship between Jesus and God, whom the Trinitarians claimed were two aspects of the same being. For them, Jesus was God and God was Jesus. On this point, Channing asserted that "we believe that Jesus was one mind, one soul, one being, as truly one as we are, and equally distinct from the one God. We complain of the doctrine of the Trinity," he continues, "that, not satisfied with making God three beings, it makes Jesus Christ two beings, and thus introduces infinite confusion into our conception of his character." Channing went on to refer to trinitarianism as a "corruption of Christianity, alike repugnant to common sense and to the general strain of the Scripture." He concludes this section of his sermon with the declaration that, were Jesus truly God, his torture and death on the cross would have no meaning. In contrast, he wrote, Jesus being fully human "renders his sufferings, and his patience and love in bearing them, incomparably more impressive and affecting than the system we oppose."

Channing then launched into perhaps the most provocative portion of his sermon (if it's even possible to be more provocative than he's been already), when he describes what he calls the "moral perfection of God." Let me read you his exact words here. Listen to how they confront the prevailing Calvinist doctrine of the Elect: "We believe that God is infinitely good, kind, benevolent, in the proper sense of these words; good in disposition, as well as in act; good, not to a few but to all; good to every individual as well as to the general system. We believe, too, that God is just; but we never forget that his justice is the justice of a good being, dwelling in the same mind, and acting in harmony, with perfect benevolence." Channing's God is a parental God, who loves his children entirely and without reservation, and who wants the best for them. To Channing, those who claim a God who brings creatures wholly depraved into the world only to judge them and to punish them, saving only a select few, blaspheme against the true and good nature of the divine creator.

Channing goes on to describe the salvational role played by Jesus Christ. Rejecting the orthodox principle of vicarious atonement - that Jesus died for our sins - as unscriptural, Channing declares that Jesus was sent to us by God "to effect a moral, or spiritual deliverance of mankind." Jesus accomplished this through a variety of methods, most notably through his example of moral and ethical living. Channing referred to Jesus as a Saviour, "chiefly as he is the light, physician, and guide of the dark, diseased and wandering mind." He concludes his manifesto with the assertion that you will know a true Christian not by his beliefs alone, but by his works, by his deeds. True piety, he said, requires love of God, love of Jesus, and loving action for the benefit of one's fellow human beings.

Today we can only imagine the impact that Channing's tour-de-force had on the landscape of the American Christian church. The text of Unitarian Christianity was immediately published as a pamphlet and disseminated up and down the East Coast. Eventually, its circulation would exceed that of any other American publication up to that time, save only Tom Paine's Common Sense.^[3] By the time that Channing had made it back as far as New York City on his return to Boston, hundreds of people thronged to hear him preach and, as a result, All Souls Church was founded. Just one year after Channing's address, there were some 120 Unitarian congregations in Massachusetts, and five years after that they organized themselves into the American Unitarian Association, the precursor to our Unitarian Universalist Association. Interestingly, Channing was nominated to become the first president of the organization, but he declined.

The tree of Unitarianism, and now Unitarian Universalism, has branched out and spread far from Channing's teachings of Unitarian Christianity in his Baltimore Sermon. We are more theologically, culturally, and socially diverse than were the liberal churches of his day. Yet we find in our current incarnation the echoes of Channing's words. Our commitment to the use of reason in interpreting sacred texts. Our determination to cohere human experience and natural law with our experiences of transcending mystery and wonder. The role of Jesus as a teacher, mentor and guide in many of our lives. And our belief that the practice of religion requires us to engage with the world, to be active participants in the unfolding events of our lives, bringing to bear our commitment to compassion, justice, liberty and peace. Today we are still held fast by the roots of our faith so carefully cultivated by William Ellery Channing nearly 200 years ago. Roots hold us close. Wings set us free.

Blessed be and amen.

Footnotes:

^[1] Wright, A Stream of Light, p. 6.
^[2] UUA Article on William Ellory Channing
^[3] Wright, p. 24.

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