A Unitarian's Sunday

Ezra Stiles Gannett (May 4, 1801-August 26, 1871) had the unenviable task of being William Ellery Channing's colleague and successor at Federal Street Church in Boston. He was a founder of the American Unitarian Assoiation and was tireless in its promotion. Much more can be found at the Dictionary of Unitarian and Universalist Biography at http://www25-temp.uua.org/uuhs/duub/articles/ezrastilesgannett.html.
Following is an account of a typical Sunday at the Gannett home taken from the wonderful memoir of Ezra Stiles by his son William C. Gannett.

"And all days looked towards Sunday, the father's work-day. It began on Saturday evening. For the children, no party-going then, no noisy game, no novel after nine o'clock; even sewig after nine was mild sacrilege, against which the feeling brought from childhood made a protest. He usually took tea that evening with one dear friend close by. On returning, the week's accounts were puzzled and squared. And then, the world's work over, the children, as they came in to kiss good-night, would see perhaps the first sheet of the sermon started, theme and text at top. The thinking for it had been done before upon the streets. On and on through the small hours the lamp kept bright. Downstairs the tea-pot simmered on the range, and a little waiter held the slice of Graham bread and crackers for the midnight freshening. The study-couch was usually bed, and the morning found the sermon on page fourteenth or fifteenth. Seven or eight pages yet to be despatched; but they were sure to come, the last as the bells rang church-time.
Twice always the children went to church, besides the Sunday school. No household task that could be spared was done, that all the family might share the Sabbath rest. Year in, year out, the cold corned beef and Indian pudding, prepared the day before, appeared at dinner,-until at last a revolution happened, and a plum-pudding dynasty succeeded. Grave books were read,-Paradise Lost, Butler's Analogy, or smaller reading to match. In the twilight, as the father rested on the couch or in the great arm-chair, the children had their best hour with him: in younger days reciting Dr. Channing's little catechism; when older, giving memories of the sermons, or telling what they had read, and saying favorite hymns...Sunday evening the table must be more plentiful, to honor the likely guest; and after tea, if no engagement called him forth, the circle was apt to be enlarged by parish callers...."

Finishing the "world's work" and consecrating a time for higher thoughts and for rest. Though the forms and practices of a Gannett Sunday are long gone, we would be the better for finding ways to so live the Sabbath (even without having to write a 20+page sermon to focus our thoughts!)

intuition and experience...

I have written before of the importance to my own developing Unitarianism of the book, "Ezra Stiles Gannett: Unitarian Minister in Boston."  I came across it at the first UU Church I ever attended.  On a wall shelf in the hall were 10 or so volumes, one of which was "Gannett." It was the only "old" book on the shelf and I later learned that it had never in any-one's memory been moved from its place.  The man revealed in its pages was immediately fascinating to me.  For more on why, see past blog entries here. 
   A conservative, Gannett was not an admirer of the Transcendentalist movement.  The Memoir, written by Gannett's son (who was) is fascinating on the rise of Transcendentalism and its impact on Unitarianism.  An excerpt...

"Viewed as a school of philosophy, the Transcendentalists were simply the little New England quota in the great return of thinkers to Idealism, after the long captivity to Sensationalism. Returns almost inevitably have the exaggeration and one-sidedness of reaction. The new king usurps entire allegiance, whereas allegiance seems due to one who rules at once both kingdoms, Intuition and Experience. As a school of critics, they were the earliest here who boldly used the modern historic method in the study of the Bible. As a school of theology, they dispensed with Mediation, in order to claim for the soul access direct to its Father. They have been credited with bringing the doctrine of the Holy Spirit into the Unitarian "common sense in religion." But more than the common doctrine of the Holy Spirit, and more than Orthodoxy compassed by its faith in Incarnation and the Helping Grace, their thought really implied. It implied a universal law of access and communion. It affirmed abiding contact of the finite and the Infinite in virtue of the very nature of the soul and Over-Soul. Inspiration fresh as well as old; Revelation constant; Miracle but the human spirit's pinnacle of action ; God the living God, not a deity then and there announcing himself with evidence of authenticity, but indwelling here and now in every presence, — this was " Transcendentalism."

Blessings
(for more on the Holy Spirit, see today's post at Wonderful Epoch)

girding the loins...

Class is the big discussion right now in Unitarian Universalism...This from William Gannett's splendid biography of his father, Ezra Stiles Gannett. The elder Gannett is now a "Father in the Church" and part of a very dwindling "old fashioned Unitarian" contingent. In talking about the post Civil War years, the younger Gannett writes...

"Never since the early days had the opportunity seemed so good for promoting a liberal form of Christianity. It was just at the close of the war. The sympathies wakened by the four years of struggle had crossed sect-lines as well as State-lines. Dogmas had paled before stern tests of life and death, and differencing creeds grew small by the side of the helpfulness in which all joined heart and hand. To earnest Unitarians, the opportunity spoke like God's command to strip off the traditions of culture and aristocracy that had so long stifled influence, and to press among the people with their gospel. In April, 1865, they met in National Conference at New York, to carry out their purpose. The whole body seemed to be vitalized. The churches were soon organized into Local Conferences, reporting to a General Conference every year or two. New missionary effort, both in East and West, was resolved on, and far larger contributions than were ever asked before were easily obtained. Citytheatres were engaged for free Sunday services, and the great audiences seemed to show that the people had been reached. Here and there "Unions" sprang up for benevolent work and social fellowship. A popular monthly — a magazine less of ideas than of stories embodying ideals, and of records to stimulate practical progress — took the place of the scholarly " Examiner," that had crept the round of the ministers' studies for so many years. Before long a new Theological School, with a lowered standard of education, was established, in the hope of inducing more young men to enter the Liberal ministry. And the doctrinal basis of the denomination was widened as far as the National Conference could widen it while remaining distinctly "Christian:" "Other Christian Churches" had been invited to join the Conference; and presently, to meet the objections of certain friends disturbed by a creedlike phrase in the Constitution referring to the "Lordship " of Jesus Christ, an article was expressly added to declare that all such expressions represented only the belief of the majority, and bound none who did not freely give assent. — Possibly this uprising and girding of the loins for a mission among the people may by and by be recognized as the beginning of a new era in Unitarian history."

Blessings

a grand spectacle...

Ezra Stiles Gannett was an excellent evangelist for the new AUA and an early officer. It was said by a contemporary that if they had had 50 Gannetts Unitarianism would have swept the country. At the same time, he was often nearly crippled with insecurity about his gifts (replacing William Ellery Channing will do that to a preacher...)

In this sermon, Gannett presents a very central, and very positive, view of what Unitarianism is about-life.

"I am come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly." John x:x

The doctrine of " Life," though it has not received from Christian men the attention to which from its place in the Gospel it is entitled, is really the heart of the Gospel, the innermost of what may justly be styled the doctrines of grace. " I am come," said Jesus, " that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly." How could he have described the design of his mission in plainer words? Abundance of life, — growth, force, satisfaction, — all that enters into our idea of a vigorous vitality,—this is the ultimate purpose of the Divine economy in Christ.

What a grand spectacle is a true life, — severe in its rectitude, sublime in its purpose, beneficent in its action; a life devoted to God, though spent among men; a life sincere and therefore fresh, laborious and therefore useful, above low aims and mean arts; wise in its faith, generous in its ardor, sweet in its spirit, devout in its aspiration! How do the honors and praises and pleasures of the world fade into dimness before the splendor of a righteousness like this! What a depth of Divine philosophy was there in that saying, commonplace as it may seem to us who have heard it read from our childhood, " A man's life consisteth not in the abundance of the things which he possesseth "!...

Now I say that the truth which distinguishes our religious body is that of which our text is the concise yet sufficient expression ; which other portions of the Church, indeed, have not always failed to recognize as a part of the gospel, — how could they, when it was so plain ? — but which they have treated with comparative neglect. It is our office to rescue it from such neglect. I claim for it priority and sovereignty...

Our whole life, outward and inward, may be " hidden with Christ in God," because it shall all — all, from meanest toil to holiest prayer — be that living sacrifice, of which Christ is both the author and the type...

Oh for the men who shall preach " Christ the life of the world," with a zeal ready to cry out, Woe is me, if I preach not the living gospel! O God! raise thou up another Wesley, another Luther, another Paul, with the gospel of life in their hearts and on their tongues, to send it through the land, across the sea, around the earth! O Christ! inspire thou another John with thine own temper, that his words, like those of thine apostle, may be full of persuasion, declaring that " God so loved us, that He sent His only begotten Sou into the world, that we might live through him."

"That we might live through him." Bear these words in your remembrance, believer, wherever you go: they shall be your defence and your solace. Repeat them in the ears of your fellow-men: the weary heart of society will listen and rejoice. Pronounce them where sin gathers its votaries, and the dead shall start into life. Inscribe them on the tomb, and our burial- places shall be known as the gateways of immortality."

Blessings

not my business...

Fairly regular readers will know that I love, and often excerpt, the "life and letters" memoirs that were the norm during the heyday of the Boston Unitarians.  Written to memorialize and to inspire, these memoirs are often affectionate and almost devotional.  What they don't often do, however, is describe in any detail the internal struggles that are inherent in living. I think that is why, for example, Ezra Stiles Gannett's memoir, written by his son, is so remarkable.  More often, these struggles are, if mentioned at all, described in the context of having been conquered.  This short paragraph in the memoir of Rufus Ellis is an example-

"... those who knew Rufus Ellis well know how, like the late Dr. Gannett, he suffered from periods of despondency. Such struggles are constant in the lives of many ministers who strive to do conscientious service. The life of Rufus Ellis formed no exception. There are frequent indications in the entries in his diary of the clouds which gathered. That he fought manfully against these persistent obstacles is apparent from the success which attended his efforts not to obtrude his own sufferings upon the attention of others."

The almost martyr like qualities of Channing and Ware, are, to be sure, sometimes reported as cautionary, but that martyr aspect remains. 

While I love the fact that these memoirs eschew excessive psychoanalyzing and personal revelation (I don't suppose that many of us, were all aspects of our internal life revealed, come out maintaining much dignity, and the strain of biography that seeks to do that is less than helpful), I do long, on occasion, to learn more about the struggles of these religious leaders so important in my own spiritual life.   

That being said, I remember that during my days as a middle school teacher, the mantra I tried to instill in my students, who were all too interested in the details of each other's lives, was "It's not my business!"  It is no great insight that in this age of instant information, privacy is nearly gone (the very concept is changing and not, I fear, for the better.)  So come to think of it, I think I will keep reading my old, falling apart "life and letters" memoirs where dignity isn't lost in revelation. 

Blessings

a pious reception...

The "old school" Unitarian, Ezra Stiles Gannett has, the past couple of days, talked about the mystery of God. As a fairly conservative Christian, Gannett was no friend of "Transcendentalism" and yet, as the following from Ralph Waldo Emerson shows, they agreed that its all about reception. As a lover of books and study, I must admit that this has been a life-long barrier for me. Can someone tell me why simple "reception" is so difficult?

"Our spontaneous action is always the best. You cannot with your best deliberation and heed come so close to any question as your spontaneous glance shall bring you, whilst you rise from your bed, or walk abroad in the morning after meditating the matter before sleep on the previous night. Our thinking is a pious reception. Our truth of thought is therefore vitiated as much by too violent direction given by our will, as by too great negligence. We do not determine what we will think. We only open our senses, clear away as we can all obstruction from the fact, and suffer the intellect to see. We have little control over our thoughts. We are the prisoners of ideas...

In every man's mind, some images, words and facts remain, without effort on his part to imprint them, which others forget, and afterwards these illustrate to him important laws. All our progress is an unfolding, like the vegetable bud. You have first an instinct, then an opinion, then a knowledge, as the plant has root, bud and fruit. Trust the instinct to the end, though you can render no reason. It is vain to hurry it. By trusting it to the end, it shall ripen into truth and you shall know why you believe."

Blessings

most common details of life...

One of my favorite books is "Ezra Stiles Gannett: A Unitarian Minister in Boston" written by his son, the Unitarian minister William C. Gannett. I discovered it in the very early days of my exposure to Unitarianism and was struck by the character and qualities of this man (see the Dictionary of Unitarian Universalist Biography for more...) This from his sermon:

"GREAT PRINCIPLES IN SMALL MATTERS." (1849)

Luke xvi. 10: "He that is faithful in that which is least is faithful also in much: and he that is unjust in the least is unjust also in much."

One of the most remarkable peculiarities of our religion is its connection of the sublimest truths with the most common details of life. The revelation of the Christian faith, how grand ! the duties of the Christian life, how simple...

In the life of Jesus, that best commentary upon his religion, we find the same union of great principles with the incidents of daily life. It is the character of Jesus that gives grandeur to the situations in which he is placed, not the situations that make the character appear extraordinary. He never sought to draw attention to himself by an unusual manner of life; he affected no dignity, studied no arts of impression, and in his outward relations exhibited no desire to be unlike the men among whom he lived...

These domestic affairs, this worldly business, must not be neglected, but they must be Christianized, spiritualized, beatified. Christianity is a religion for the earth and the world, for home and society, a religion which the statesman, the merchant, and the day-laborer, the rich man, the poor man, the sick man, the mother, the girl, the child, must all feel in its continually restraining, moulding, and quickening influence, as they fulfil the engagements of their several positions...How? By bringing great principles into connection with little matters...

The idea of duty our religion binds in with all our mental and physical experience. For, in revealing the moral character of our present life, the responsibleness under which we are placed in the midst of the circumstances that surround us, the obligation to make every thing subservient to the growth and perfection of character, it compels the true disciple, the man who believes with a steady faith, to recognize a law that touches on every relation and act of his being. He can do nothing so small that it has not a moral value...

We may now perceive both the justice and the extent of the law of which our text is the expression, " He that is faithful in that which is least is faithful also in much, and he that is unjust in the least is unjust also in much ; " a law inseparable from the rectitude of the Divine Providence, and conducive to the welfare of man. I will but add two brief remarks, which are suggested as of most practical value. First, in regard to ourselves. Let it be our object to establish Christian habits. Our habits constitute our character. Let them be pervaded and moulded by the religion of Christ. Let our faith become habitual, our piety habitual, our benevolence habitual. Let duty become a habit. Then shall we be safe; then will life be pleasant and holy.

Secondly, in regard to our children. Let us implant in them right principles. They must form their own habits, but we can fix their principles. Out of the latter will arise the former. Let us establish in their hearts the great principles of piety and duty, and they will be prepared to meet the temptations and bear the responsibilities of life.

With good habits growing out of right principles in ourselves, and right principles growing up into good habits in our children, why should we not be as happy as in this life of vicissitude man can ever be ? We shall have nothing to fear on this side the grave, since we shall be prepared for all change in outward condition by the inward stability we shall maintain. Nor shall we have reason to dread what we may encounter hereafter; since, having been faithful in that which is least, as it arose under the various relations of life, we shall receive the approbation of Him whose welcome voice shall pronounce the sentence: " Well done, good and faithful servant: thou hast been faithful over a few things, I will make thee ruler over many things: enter thou into the joy of thy Lord."

Have a wonderful Sabbath. Blessings

clicking along the sidewalks...

The first time I ever stepped foot in a Unitarian Church was about eight years ago. I was a full-time stay at home father for then two very young children and a retired couple with a granddaughter the same age as my oldest became good friends. In the course of one of our weekly talks, with children running about, they mentioned that they were Unitarians and I allowed as to how I (though an Episcopalian at the time) had, for some time studied Unitarian history and found many of the founding generation of American Unitarians to be my spiritual teachers.

The couple invited me to give three lay talks at their church. At one of those talks, I happened to see a small shelf of six or eight fairly nondescript books and one old book. I have written before of my love for old books, so I gave it a look. It was "Ezra Stiles Gannett: Unitarian Minister in Boston" I borrowed and read it and have since found my own copy. Written by his son, I was struck with the honesty of the book and the person that emerged from its pages.

Many things about ESG resonated with me but I think the most profound was his life-long, often near paralyzing struggle with self-distrust and feelings of inadequacy. And yet, he did the work...

In early middle age, ESG suffered a stroke that necessitated the use of two small hand crutches which became his constant companions from then on. His son puts it thus, "They (the canes) became a part of him, the signal to eye and ear, by which everyone knew 'Dr. Gannett' in Boston streets. When in a hurry for the cars, and he always was,-his quick-leaps between them, as he fled clicking along the sidewalks, used to make the boys turn and shout; a tribute that he never seemed to notice..." (the illustration above is a wood-cut illustration from the book)

And yet he did the work...

Blessings

heart opened in its confidence...

Some years ago, while serving on the vestry of a small Episcopal Church, a man whom I had seen often but rarely heard speak (he was a retired doctor and I had always seen him as somewhat aloof) mentioned in a meeting about worship that he went for the mystery. It was all he said but it had a big impact on me. Now, years later and a Unitarian, I must confess that I sometimes miss the focus on the mystery in the larger denomination. In our exalting of reason and rationality, it is too easy to forget the wonder of what we do not know. Ezra Stiles Gannett speaks of this in his sermon (from 1857) appropriately called, "The Mysteries." Some excerpts:

"1 Tim. iii: 9: " Holding the mystery of the faith in a pure conscience."

Our life is embosomed in mystery, the universe is wrapped in a garment of mystery. The unknown infinitely exceeds the known; the incomprehensible outweighs beyond all comparison the intelligible. To some persons this is an unpleasant fact. Yet, properly regarded, it would give them great comfort. Religion conducts us to the borders of mystery. Whatever direction we pursue in our religious inquiries, we are soon brought to a pause by limits which we cannot pass. With some persons this is a special occasion of surprise, disappointment, and complaint, while it should, on the contrary, strengthen their faith and enliven their gratitude...

...there are profound and solemn mysteries to which we are guided by faith ; and our persuasion of the existence of these hidden realities is one of the most comforting and strengthening elements in the soul's experience. Everywhere, as we have said, we encounter mystery. Why? Because everywhere we meet the thoughts of an Infinite Mind expressing themselves in the forms which He has seen fit to adopt. Now the thoughts of an Infinite Mind are not such thoughts as our minds can entertain. As no mirror which man could make would reflect an image of the sun that should correspond in its dimensions to the sun's magnitude, so no conception of ours can represent the Divine Intelligence...

Religion, then, has its revealed truths and its hidden truths. In the former we are interested as rules of life ; how, it may be asked, can the latter become sources of benefit? By the assurance they give us of God. By the assurance they give us of God. The unknown belongs to Him whom no eye hath seen...

This difference between known truths and truths unknown, or between faith and mystery, is one of great practical importance. If properly considered, it would prevent a large amount of presumption, bigotry, and unbelief,—the bigotry and presumption of some persons driving others into the opposite extreme of unbelief. Truths which God has brought to light through the gospel, we may press upon the reception of men, by all the arguments which reverence and gratitude towards God, or love and hope for man, can prompt us to use ; but our solution of the mysteries which He has kept within His own knowledge, or has disclosed only to beings in a higher condition than ours, should be proposed with a modest distrust, as possibly or, at most, probably true, and only, therefore, worthy of attention. Let this rule be observed, and three-fourths of the controversies which have tormented the Christian Church would disappear...

There are mysteries in religion, and I am glad that there are ; for by them is my heart opened in its confidence towards God. In him is mystery that no created mind can comprehend; and therefore may the universe of created minds trust while they adore. There are mysteries of which the gospel is an intimation, and for them I am thankful; for by them I am established in my conviction that it came from the Being whose ways are past my finding out. There is that in Christ which I cannot understand. I dare not attempt to explain all I read in the New Testament, as if it were a child's elementary reading-book... what is above and beyond my reason, I expect to find there, and I will gratefully receive it. There are mysteries in my. life, — God be thanked that they are many; for so does He multiply the proofs of my dependence on Him, and the testimonies of His interest in me. There are mysteries in my spiritual experience. If there were not, how poor would that experience be,—poorer than my social or my bodily condition ! He who is impatient whenever he encounters the unintelligible must be continually offended with himself. He who would live without mystery must live without faith, without religion, without God."

Amen and blessings

the spiritual nature unfolded and excercised...

I want to put in a good word for Religion today. Religion has a bad reputation in the liberal neighborhood-have you ever heard (or said) "I am spiritual but not religious?" Ezra Stiles Gannett tells us why its difficult to have one without the other in these opening words of a sermon from 1828:

"RELIGION THE CONSCIOUSNESS AND CULTURE OF A SPIRITUAL LIFE AND OF SPIRITUAL RELATIONS.

Rom. viii. 6: "To be spiritually minded is life."

Man is connected with two states of existence, is an inhabitant of two worlds, one material and visible, the other spiritual and eternal. Bv his senses he communicates with that which is seen and present, with the objects and circumstances of earth, in affected by them, lives in them. By his mind he holds intercourse with that which is unseen yet present, with the beings and hopes of heaven, is influenced by them, lives among them, Man, therefore, is a partaker of a double life,—the one the life, of sense, the other the life of faith, — the one outward, the other interior. For this twofold existence he was designed by his Creator. It is his natural being. The foundation of religion, I repeat because it is often denied, the foundation of religion is laid in man's nature by the hand of his Creator in his religious capacities and affections, which as truly belong to his nature as do his intellectual faculties and social affections; and, if the consciousness of these latter indicates that man is designed for an intellectual or social life, the consciousness of the former indicates that he is designed for a religious or spiritual life. The poverty of language, however, obliges us when speaking of the soul to employ terms originally appropriated to the body. Thus we discourse on the spiritual vision, the inward ear, the moral taste.

It is the office of Religion to excite and cultivate these interior senses. Religion opens and purges the eye of the soul, enables it to hear spiritual truths, and causes them to be felt. Its chosen province is the soul. Its kingdom is within us, its rule is spiritual, its subject is what the apostle Peter styles the hidden man of the heart. Wonder not that man often seems to be, and is, unconscious of the elements that lie in his soul as the life of the plant in the seed, which, apparently destitute of a vital principle, needs only heat and moisture to stimulate it into action. The vital principle of religion must be excited by causes that are without it, that yet combine themselves with it. The spiritual nature must be unfolded and exercised upon suitable objects of thought, affection, desire, hope. These it does not find in human society, nor among sensible things. They are revealed and embraced through faith. By this, man is introduced to a new society, and to the knowledge of higher relations than those of time. As he becomes more conversant with the beings and hopes of a spiritual world, their relative importance grows in his estimation. His affections fasten themselves with strength on worthy objects. He perceives that he stands in the midst of infinite relations. There is a light within him brighter than the rays of the sun, and in this light he beholds spiritual and everlasting things."

Blessings

in a frail skiff...

This from Ezra Stiles Gannett's sermon "The Mystery of God"

... the intercourse of the soul with God is the most precious and vital fact of our being, involving all that is dearest in our present history, and justifying the purest and loftiest hope which we can cherish. It is a fact, however, enveloped in mystery. The soul is abashed and overwhelmed at the thought of God's nearness to its most private exercises. I am never in such multitudinous companionship as when I am alone with God; never so little alone as when conscious that He is with me whom " no eye hath seen nor can see." Let me extend my thought beyond myself and try to seize upon the truth, that He is as near to every other human being, — at the same moment cognizant of all wants and all occurrences throughout the universe of which our largest discoveries have taken in but a little part, — and I find myself like one who in a frail skiff has put off on an ocean of unknown magnitude, without sail or instrument. In my closet, I am taught by my own meditation that it is not my prayer alone which is heard. The praises and the supplications of myriads of hearts reach their common object, without being lost in confusion by the way, or failing of distinct notice by Him to whom they are all addressed. I believe it is so; I know it must be so: yet it is as impossible for me to conceive of such a personal relation of one Being to all other beings as it would be to grasp the sceptre of Almighty power and assert my right of sovereignty."

Blessings
(painting by Renoir)

same enjoyment of celestial realities...

Ezra Stiles Gannett was the great promoter and defender of "traditional Unitarianism" and, thus, was opposed to the general drift of transcendentalism. Regular readers of this blog know that I love the traditionalists AND the transcendentalists, and today's words from ESG are part of the reason why. This from his sermon, "The Soul's Salvation Through Faith in Christ"

"For us, my friends, it is sufficient to know Christ as the channel and manifestation of a Divine influence, by which the believer is so instructed, animated, enriched, and fortified, that he becomes conscious of a new experience working in him to disclose unknown capacities of life, and through this inward change spreading a new aspect over life as it lies around him...

Holiness, — it once was a more common word in Christian discourse and Christian conversation than now. Holy men and women, — why, we regard them with somewhat the same distant admiration with which we look back on the saints or martyrs of other times. Here and there we see one — a godly man, a saintly woman — standing in society like spiritual eminences that rise above the clouds of our familiar experience and enjoy the clear sunshine of God's presence. But why, tell me, I pray you, explain to yourselves, if you can, my friends, why every one of us should not aspire to the same enjoyment of celestial realities. " Be ye holy even as your Father in heaven is holy," said Jesus to the same persons to whom he delivered his instruction respecting the forgiveness of injuries and the distribution of alms. Away with the notion, which multitudes cherish, that only a few are called to be saints! Lend no countenance to this half-gospel. Every one, every one, should be a partaker of that life through which man has his fellowship with the Eternal Father and the sinless Son.

My friends, hear the words of Christ, " Whosoever — whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst; but the water that I shall give him shall be in him a fountain springing up into everlasting life." Has your experience been a confirmation of those words ? Have you ever thought that the " whoso ever " includes you ? Have you still unsatisfied wants, a restless heart, an impatient will? Do you know what distress or discontent is of which you say nothing because you but half understand it, that thirst of the soul which can be slaked only in the water of Christian salvation, that longing after peace, that dim outline of satisfaction which mocks the feeling of which it is the shadow, — do you know this ? Then take into your innermost being the influences of which Christ is the symbol and the source, —drink, drink freely, abundantly, continually, of the water that He shall give you, and you will find the relief, the rest, the satisfaction which you want."

Emerson said much the same thing when he asked "Why should not we also enjoy an original relation to the universe?" Somewhere else in Emerson is this wonderful line. "What can we excel in, if not in holiness? Many blessings

the best knowledge...

What to do when faced with the reality of "The Mystery of God?" This continuation of Ezra Stiles Gannett's sermon begun yesterday gives an answer...

"Are we, then, left to an ignorance the more painful because we are continually reminded of it by facts that bring the Divine action under our notice? No: let us with the utmost emphasis deny that we are placed in so cruel a condition. Knowledge is of two kinds, speculative and experimental, — in the head and in the heart: knowledge about which we may argue and dispute, and have our doubts, and involve ourselves in hopeless perplexity; and knowledge which is not a subject of discussion, but an element of the spiritual consciousness. If we try to enlarge the former kind of knowledge in respect to Divine things, we are liable to disappointment, we cannot indeed escape disappointment. We cannot "by Searching find out God." Searching is not the way to arrive at an acquaintance with Him. That is mental effort in a direction in which such effort will lie wasted. We must receive the truth, not hunt after it; look up to the heavens and wait, instead of digging into the earth with vain toil; open our hearts, instead of racking our brains. The best knowledge always comes in this way."

blessings

the root and the branch...

A powerful post from Peacebang yesterday. As a longtime teacher and a onetime worker in politics, I long looked to education and government as the cure for our ills and, of course compassionate government and enlightened education can and have done much. But, ultimately, for me it comes down to acceptance of our limitations and, most importantly, faith. To quote Peacebang, "Reverence, mystery, humility, service and love are the antidote."

One more from Ezra Stiles Gannett-this from sermons delineating what Unitarians believe (its not a new exercise...)

"THE VALUE OF FAITH.

We are told that we care very little about faith. " Unitarians," it is said, " talk about goodness; hope to be saved by their own good works, their own good temper;" or, when the charge is more mildly brought, it is said we exaggerate the importance of righteousness, and therefore underrate the necessity of faith. With all modesty, and yet with all firmness, such as belongs to the subject, would I deny this allegation. I say we do not undervalue faith, but we hold it to be essential to a religious experience and to a happy life. Now there are two kinds of faith, and we believe in the necessity of both kinds.

There is a faith of the mind, an intellectual faith; which receives certain truths, and endeavors to extract from them their meaning, lays up that meaning among the stores of mental learning, and there leaves it. Now, that kind of faith, though it be called barren, is yet needful, for there can be no other faith without it. That is the root. If you plant a root in the ground, and cover it up, and prevent its springing up and spreading out and bringing forth fruit, you may say it is of no use; but the root must be in the ground, or there will be no tree, no foliage, and no fruit. So ideas must be lodged in the mind, — religious ideas, — and they are the roots of character. But we are sometimes reminded that religious sentiment lies at the basis of religious life. It does sometimes; but it is not a safe reliance, friends. In the common course of events, religious sentiment may carry one forward toward perfection; but in the strain and stress of life, and when doubts come up and questions arise on this side and on that, we must have thought, and thought must grasp ideas, and those ideas must be religious ideas, and religious ideas make up one kind of faith.

But there is another kind of faith. To return again to our comparison: the root must appear before the branch, and must bring forth whatever is its characteristic product; and so faith must bring forth its own kind of excellence. Christian faith must produce Christian graces. The faith of the Gospel being planted in the soul must then quicken all the energies of the soul and cause them to expand; that is, to ripen, and to yield the fruits of salvation and life. If the faith of the mind does not thus become the faith of the heart, the intelligence, the will, it may be called, as it was by the Apostle, a " dead " faith. Sensible men will say it is an absurdity. We must invest our religious ideas in character, in life, and then they will not only be safe, but they will be profitable.
We believe, then, in the importance of faith, and we show you its twofold nature. We stand where Paul stood, when he said that " a man is justified by faith," — that is, made acceptable before God, and led by the Divine goodness toward righteousness, in consequence of his belief in, and use of, the great Christian ideas; and we stand where James stood, when he said that the mere mental reception of such ideas was insufficient, and that we must show their reality and their power in good works."

Blessings

love thy neighbor...

This from Ezra Stiles Gannett's "Election Sermon" of 1842, "The Religion of Politics."

"When I speak of the religion of political life, I mean that religion should control men in the exercise of their political rights as it should control them in all their other relations and concerns. The religion of politics is nothing else than the application of religious principles to political action, whether it be the action of a statesman or a private citizen, of an individual or of the community. The politician should respect these principles as much as any other man. Political opinion, political discussion, political life should be brought under the influence of religious convictions. This is the ground which I take, and which I shall endeavor to prove is the only ground on which a Christian can consistently stand...

It (Christianity) has one and the same instruction for all men, whether they live in palaces or wander houseless, whether they are versed in tongues or are rude of speech, men of science or men of handicraft, subjects of a monarchy or citizens of a republic; to them all it says, Hearken and obey— walk by faith—lead holy lives—fulfil all righteousness...

Christianity by addressing the common nature and unfolding the immortal destiny of mankind has shown a broad ground, on which all may meet and lift up the chorus of a united and acknowledged brotherhood. The framers of our Declaration of Independence thought they were proclaiming a political axiom, when they republished one of the great revelations of the Gospel, the full meaning of which can be learned only through sympathy with him who came to save the lost and reconcile the estranged. "The common people," it is said, "heard him gladly." And the people it is who should welcome his religion, which condemns the selfishness alike of the tyrant and of the demagogue, and rebukes at once the arrogance of an aristocratic and the meanness of a servile spirit by its pregnant charge to "honor all men." All men? What, of every class and condition? Yes, men of every name, rank, and complexion... Alas! how few yet comprehend the law, on which the morality of every Christian people, and every Christian believer, should be built—" Thou shalt love thy neighbour."

blessings