![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
Two weeks ago a gunman walked into a Unitarian-Universalist church in Tennessee during the performance of a children's play. With an shotgun and a belief that all liberals should be killed, he fired rounds into the congregation, killing two, before being wrestled to the ground. The Unitarian-Universalist community on livejournal is using this incident to explain, from our own individual and subjective opinions, who we are. The following is my personal attempt to explain the religion I adhere to.
Unitarian-Universalism is a living tradition which incorporates a heretical rationalism and moral universalism and as a result, a democratic and congregationalist approach to the management of our assets. Our historical origins are Judeo-Christian but our contemporary expression is far more diverse, recognising important contributions from all perspectives (including atheists). I have in the past described my own perspective as "an empirical atheist, a normative agnostic and an aesthetic pagan". But of course, that's not the only perspective and nor would any UU want it to be. The search and discovery of a sense of wonder at nature, personal reflection and the establishment of solidarity with others is considered far more important than the espousal of doctrinal loyalty to a supposedly infallible creed.
Historically, there is much that we can be proud of. The earliest known guarantee of religious freedom in Christian Europe is a direct result of the Unitarians. The U.S. Declaration of Independence, expressing equality and the inalienable rights of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, is a document both inspired and co-authored by unitarians along with the dedication to the separation of Church and State. During the horrors of Nazi persecution, the Unitarian Universalist Service Committee was formed in 1940 to directly aid those fleeing that regime. The organisation continues to this day and is active in carrying out relief work in worn-torn Dafur.
The Melbourne Unitarian Church was established in 1852, chaired by Victoria's first chief justice Sir William a'Beckett. In 1873 the congregation elected Martha Turner to ministership, being the first woman in what was then the British Empire to achieve such as position. She joins fellow Unitarian and suffragist Catherine Spence as one of the great Australia women of her generation. The Melbourne Church was also famous for its heavy involvement in the peace movement during the Vietnam war.
It is not as if expressing the opinions of unitarian rationalism and moral univeraslism haven't resulted in violence in the past, from 1533 Michael Servetus was burned at the stake on the advice of Calvin for his heresy to 1965 when Unitarian minister and civil rights advocate Rev. James Reeb was beaten to death by racial segregationists.
The words of Peter Gabriel's "Biko" seem most appropriate here to remember those at Tennessee.
You can blow out a candle
But you can't blow out a fire
Once the flames begin to catch
The wind will blow it higher
Unitarian-Universalism is a living tradition which incorporates a heretical rationalism and moral universalism and as a result, a democratic and congregationalist approach to the management of our assets. Our historical origins are Judeo-Christian but our contemporary expression is far more diverse, recognising important contributions from all perspectives (including atheists). I have in the past described my own perspective as "an empirical atheist, a normative agnostic and an aesthetic pagan". But of course, that's not the only perspective and nor would any UU want it to be. The search and discovery of a sense of wonder at nature, personal reflection and the establishment of solidarity with others is considered far more important than the espousal of doctrinal loyalty to a supposedly infallible creed.
Historically, there is much that we can be proud of. The earliest known guarantee of religious freedom in Christian Europe is a direct result of the Unitarians. The U.S. Declaration of Independence, expressing equality and the inalienable rights of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, is a document both inspired and co-authored by unitarians along with the dedication to the separation of Church and State. During the horrors of Nazi persecution, the Unitarian Universalist Service Committee was formed in 1940 to directly aid those fleeing that regime. The organisation continues to this day and is active in carrying out relief work in worn-torn Dafur.
The Melbourne Unitarian Church was established in 1852, chaired by Victoria's first chief justice Sir William a'Beckett. In 1873 the congregation elected Martha Turner to ministership, being the first woman in what was then the British Empire to achieve such as position. She joins fellow Unitarian and suffragist Catherine Spence as one of the great Australia women of her generation. The Melbourne Church was also famous for its heavy involvement in the peace movement during the Vietnam war.
It is not as if expressing the opinions of unitarian rationalism and moral univeraslism haven't resulted in violence in the past, from 1533 Michael Servetus was burned at the stake on the advice of Calvin for his heresy to 1965 when Unitarian minister and civil rights advocate Rev. James Reeb was beaten to death by racial segregationists.
The words of Peter Gabriel's "Biko" seem most appropriate here to remember those at Tennessee.
You can blow out a candle
But you can't blow out a fire
Once the flames begin to catch
The wind will blow it higher