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Why not Unitarian?

3/8/2010

2 Comments

 
One might have thought that Free Christianity would be entirely at home under the umbrella that bears the name of the 'General Assembly of Unitarian and Free Christian Churches'.  But it is a fact that many Unitarians today are not only in no sense Christian but they regard themselves as members of a non-Christian religion.  Indeed a significant minority are hostile to Christian witness within the movement.  This, together with the seemingly relentless tide in favour of establishing a single corporate identity for the movement (to portray it less as a general assembly and more as a single entity), means that the Free Christian aspect is under continual threat. Every other year there is a new initiative to rid the movement of what many see as an awkward and (even worse) out-of-date appendage to its title. 

The Unitarian Christian Association is doing good work to restore the fortunes of Christian witness within the movement and the concerns of Free Christianity very largely overlap with Unitarian Christianity.  It is also true that Unitarian Christianity is far less 'sectarian' and more Free Christian in its outlook than it was once (the two earliest Unitarian organisations in England both had constitutions that excluded Arians for example, and in later times strict Unitarians would denounce Free Christians' 'sickly' non-sectarianism).

While Free Christianity is not quite identical with Unitarian Christianity and there is a need for the Free Christian aspect of the movement to have active and explicit witness, the 'Free Christian' part of the name General Unitarian of Unitarian and Free Christian Churches also bears witness to the general commitment in the General Assembly's Object to uphold the liberal Christian tradition.
2 Comments
Scott Wells link
16/9/2010 11:52:39 am

Can you say more about the Arian-banning orgs?

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Tim
16/9/2010 05:36:22 pm

This is a preliminary reply composed without benefit of my notes. The first two Unitarian regional societies set up in Britain (in 1791 and 1792) were the London and the West of England Unitarian Societies. They had similar constitutions that, guided by Thomas Belsham (I think it was), were deliberately worded in such a way as to make them unacceptable to Arians. In teh case of the West of England Society it was only in the 1830s that the constitution was changed.

I'll try to compose a more detailed reply in due course.

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