[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
.Courtesy of Unitarian Universalist Association Dorothea Dix.Courtesy of The Schlesinger Library,Radcliffe Institute, Harvard University Lydia Maria Child.Courtesy of The Schlesinger Library,Radcliffe Institute, Harvard University Olympia Brown.Courtesy of Unitarian Universalist Association Mary Livermore.Courtesy of the author Clarence Russell Skinner.Courtesy of Unitarian Universalist Association Aurelia Henry Reinhardt.Courtesy of Mills College Art Museum William Sinkford.Courtesy of Unitarian Universalist Association LINDSEY, THEOPHILUS (1723 1808) " 303Yorkshire.Here he became friendly with Archdeacon Blackburne andeventually married Blackburne s stepdaughter, who was a firm sup-porter of Lindsey when all others deserted him.After three years hemoved on to a parish in Dorset at Piddletown.He remained there forseven years and had a promising ministry, but he began to have ques-tions about the Trinity.Becoming a serious student of the Bible, hefinally concluded that Christ was a mere human being.In 1763 hemoved back to the north of England to serve at Catterick, near Rich-mond.Here he set up Bible classes for village children and schoolsfor the poor, but his parish successes were outweighed by the loss ofintegrity he felt about his beliefs.In 1769 he met Joseph Priestley,who would become his friend.At the time Lindsey was being advisedby others to revise the liturgy in order to accommodate his beliefs butnot resign from the church.For a time he became involved in a move-ment for clergy who opposed subscribing to doctrinal formulas, theFeathers Tavern Petition, but it was defeated, and Lindsey becamemore insistent that he would resign.After he did so, many of hisfriends refused to speak to him.Lindsey was not deterred and settledon a plan to organize a purely Unitarian congregation in London.Nearly destitute, the family sold most of its belongings, including thefurniture and Lindsey s library.During the journey to London, Lind-sey saw Samuel Clarke s revised Book of Common Prayer for thefirst time.He also wrote an account of the errors of Christendom andthe development of Unitarian thought, which was later published asThe Apology of Theophilus Lindsey.After settling in London, Lindsey found a site for a chapel in aroom on Essex Street that was used for book auctions and set up aliturgy based on an adapted version of Clarke s revisions.On April17, 1774, Lindsey conducted the first avowedly Unitarian service inEngland without wearing the usual white surplice.There were about200 people there, including Benjamin Franklin, who continued to at-tend while he was in England.The congregation grew, and a little lessthan four years later a newly renovated Essex Street chapel, whichthey now owned, was opened with a large chapel on one floor andminister s residence on another.Not long after this, Lindsey becameill and the congregation started to search for an assistant.John Disneywas called to that position in 1783.After this Lindsey was able tospend more time writing.In 1783 he produced the first attempt to link 304 " LIVERMORE, MARY ASHTON RICE (1820 1905)all the Unitarian movements in one history, An Historical View.ofthe Unitarian Doctrine and Worship from the Reformation to OurOwn Times.A few years after that Lindsey publicly defended hisfriend Priestley when the president of Magdalen College, Oxford, at-tacked him and pronounced him unfit to write.In 1788 he publishedVindiciae Priestleianae: An Address to the Students of Oxford andCambridge, and then followed that two years later with a work thatmore directly addressed the question of Christ s nature: A Second Ad-dress,.etc.Here Lindsey questioned the historical validity of theGospel stories and the miracles and said that the human Jesus wassubject to the same frailties and errors as everyone else.He also omit-ted the Apostles Creed from the final version of the liturgy he pro-duced.Lindsey resigned from his pastorate when he reached the ageof 70 and enjoyed a relatively peaceful retirement.He was active witha new publishing organization, the Unitarian Society for PromotingChristian Knowledge.When John Disney resigned from Essex Street,Lindsey hoped his successor would be from among the ranks of dis-satisfied Anglican clergy, but a Dissenter, Thomas Belsham, was set-tled.Much to his dismay, Lindsey s hope for a mass exodus from theranks of Anglican clergy never materialized.Early in 1808 he becamequite ill and died that year on November 3.Although he was not anoriginal thinker, Lindsey was a courageous and determined leader forthe early Unitarian movement in England.By 1810 there were 20Unitarian congregations in England, and Lindsey had laid the ground-work for the future expansion of the faith.LIVERMORE, MARY ASHTON RICE (1820 1905).Lived a long,productive life advocating for reform and women s rights.She wasborn in Boston on December 19, 1820, into a faithful Calvinist Bap-tist family.The fourth of six children born to Timothy and Zebiah(Ashton), Rice was an active, athletic girl, who loved learning.Atabout the time that she finished attending the Hancock School, hersister Rachel died, and Mary was tormented with the question of sal-vation.She was sent to the Charlestown Female Academy and grad-uated when she was 16.After a year of teaching, she defied her par-ents by accepting a position as a governess with a family in Virginia.For three years she experienced slavery firsthand and became a com-mitted abolitionist.During this sojourn she found books by Deists LIVERMORE, MARY ASHTON RICE (1820 1905) " 305Ethan Allen and Thomas Paine in her employer s library and ac-quainted herself with these radical views, which she could not recon-cile with her childhood orthodoxy.When she returned home, shemoved to Duxbury in 1842 to run a school
[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]