USA > Massachusetts > Plymouth County > Plymouth > The church of the Pilgrim Fathers > Part 8
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How, in this ancient parish, the change from orthodoxy to liberal Christianity came about, is not easily answered. It may be questioned as to just how orthodox were the Pilgrims. They were creedless. They were opposed to putting a final period to their faith. They believed that "The Lord hath more truth and light yet to break forth from out his Holy Word." They never voted to "become Unitarian." They never voted to withdraw from orthodox
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WHY A UNITARIAN CHURCH?
fellowship. They never abridged their independence, and this old Pilgrim church is still an independent church. It is difficult to see how the vote calling Rev. James Kendall is to be considered a vote for Unitarianism because it was obviously not Unitarian for sometime afterwards. It was in good congregational orthodox fellowship and its rites were requested by the Episcopalian clergyman of Scituate for his parishioners sojourning in Plymouth, several years after Dr. Kendall's ministry began.
Unitarianism did not apparently begin then, nor do I think it began later. Unitarianism is an attitude, and an approach to religious inquiry. The First Church never voted to become Unitarian, because it never felt it was making a radical change. Likewise it never voted to depart from orthodoxy because it never of its own free will de- parted from orthodoxy. Eventually, the orthodox churches ceased offering it fellowship. The First Church perhaps came nearer than any other to being a "bridge church" between the various Protestant sects than did any other church. Sectarianism could not allow a bridge to be built over its walls, and so gradually the First Church came to find that only the broader, freer, more openly liberal churches, called Unitarian, accepted its fellowship. It has never bowed to sectarianism, however, and continues to open its doors and fellowship to all, claiming a unique re- lationship to all Protestantism.
If the Pilgrims were to have made a choice, I imagine that they very well might have made the Unitarian choice themselves. There is something divinely poetic in the Pilgrim church becoming Unitarian in faith, while re- maining independent in congregational polity. This First Church is the Genesis of our American Bible. It is the
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Mother Church of American non-conformity. For over three hundred and twenty-five years it has been a con- tinuously active church. Here is the fountainhead of American congregational churchmanship and democratic liberalism. Archbishop Aglipay of the Independent Catho- lic Church of the Philippine Islands called it the "Bethle- hem of the Republic" when he was here over a dozen years ago.
Who' were the Pilgrims? We all know, but I like to recall the words of John Masefield,
The pilgrims leave no impression of personality upon the mind. They were not "remarkable." Not one of them had compelling personal genius, or marked talent for the work in hand. They were plain men of moderate abilities, who giving up all things, went to live in the wilds, at unknown cost to themselves, in order to preserve to their children a life in the soul.
They were Englishmen. They were independents. They came from East Anglia. They were Separatists. Their sojourn in Holland showed them religious liberty in ac- tion. Their voyage to these shores, their drawing of the Compact aboard ship to secure a democratic means of government, is known by every schoolboy in the land. In the same way, perhaps at the same time, their church was formed. I like to think that the same Compact founded not only this town but this church.
In the epic of the Pilgrims their character stands out: courage, patience, faith. Not one of them returned to England, abandoning his comrades. They were genuine progressives, whose breadth of view was to be shown not only in their democracy, but in their treatment of the Indians, and later of Quakers, witches and others who
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differed from them. They felt their way. They tried com- munism and discarded it. They developed town govern- ment. They maintained liberty and equality under the law.
Still more important, we see the Pilgrims to stand out in their time because of their integrity of spirit, their honesty. They could not tolerate or stand for hypocrisy. They would not admit a lie. They were honest above all else. They sought to build a church for honest men. It was not necessary to think alike for them. It was necessary that they be honest with themselves and their neighbors. Their church was creedless. They respected one another because they knew they were honest in their opinions with each other.
The answer to "Why a Unitarian Church?" can be given in terms of two different approaches. First, in terms of the Pilgrim origins. Secondly, in terms of the needs of today.
Nothing stands out more important in the Pilgrim ad- venture than their forthright honesty. A church that guarantees them their individual right to honesty is part of the answer. A church which cannot be honest, nor allow its members to hold honest opinions, is a diabolical con- nivance of the devil.
Only recently I have seen a statement by Pierre Van Paassen, which gives another interesting answer:
Before the Pilgrim Fathers boarded ship at Delftshaven, one of their number a pastor by the name of John Robinson, declared that they bewailed the condition of the reformed churches "which have come to a period in their religion," and that, therefore, they (the Pilgrims) now went "forth (to America) to whatever light of truth they might receive."
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That was a daring attitude to take in those days, for it showed a frame of mind diametrically at variance with the spirit of the age, in addition to running counter to the pre- carious material interests of the Pilgrims themselves. Yet those men refused to stand still by revealed religious truth. They had open minds and open hearts for whatever new ideas, new visions, new goals and new revelations might come their way in the new land. They said, in effect, that they did not believe that God had spoken through His sages and prophets of old only to fall back into silence forever after. They expected, - nay, they fully anticipated - that He would speak again, not only in far-off Palestine, or in England, Hol- land, Oxford or Geneva, but right here in America as well, in this New England, in these New Netherlands.
Now when these Pilgrims spoke that way, they definitely spoke in the Unitarian spirit. For the Unitarian spirit accepts as its only discipline the discipleship to advancing truth. It is the modern scientific spirit which recognizes the truth alone as its mentor and censor, even if that truth, at times, is painful to hear - that is, when it destroys fondly cherished illusions, when it invalidates longheld views or destroys symbols, which were, perhaps, fair and edifying in their day.
It may be said that the Unitarian spirit came upon the his- torical scene in this country hand in hand with the Pilgrim Fathers. And with it came the thought of religious social activity, as well as that phenomenal religiously-motivated con- fidence in the future which has characterized and has so largely contributed to the growth of the American nation throughout the centuries. Like many others, Unitarians recognized that society needs a religious basis. But unlike others they insisted that religion itself must have a social expression.
Speaking in terms of large social and religious move- ments, Pierre Van Paassen gives a part of the answer as to why the Pilgrim church in Plymouth has found itself in the Unitarian fellowship. A century ago, perhaps, this would have been even truer than it is today. During the
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WHY A UNITARIAN CHURCH?
more than half a century I have been a minister, I have seen many changes. Among them all, none has been so startling, so encouraging, as the advance of liberal thought and feeling throughout the domain of religion. Every- where walls are going down. Old distinctions are vanish- ing. Ancient emphases on differences are being overlooked. True it is that here and there strongholds of ancient belief stand formidable, impregnable, insisting on the faith once and for all delivered to the Saints, unchanged, eternal. But like the Egyptian pyramids, in the theological land- scape these rear their heads as reminders of a day that is dead, as interesting memorials of vanished yesterdays. All around them representatives of various schools of religious thought possessed of a new spirit of comradeship, brotherliness, and mutual understanding are manifestly getting together, pooling their resources, making common cause. Even a movement reminding Catholics, Protestants, and Jews of their common birthright, the underlying prin- ciples of universal religion, is rendering valiant service. Proof of their liberal trends are visible to all who have eyes to see.
Of late years, I have been privileged to conduct worship in almost as many orthodox churches as Unitarian. Bap- tists, Methodists, Congregationalists, have given me cordial welcome. And among them all I have found an atmosphere of sincere friendliness, open-minded hospitality to new truth, people sincere, consecrated, forward-looking. Why, then, a Unitarian church?
There is one factor that still differentiates us from our neighbors, which in my opinion still constitutes our pri- mary excuse for being. So in the mid-twentieth century I would say that there is still need for this old Pilgrim
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church to maintain the fellowship accepted in the nine- teenth century. Until other denominations recognize this factor as absolutely necessary, stress it as vigorously as we do, we must survive as a Unitarian church, continuing our efforts unabated.
There is one virtue which from the beginning has been our distinguishing characteristic and which still endures in all its primitive glory. We have no creed. Starting as a protest against Calvinistic theology, through the succeed- ing generations our beliefs have undergone many changes. Today Channing Unitarianism is altogether obsolete, "a dome of many colored glass." It was supplanted by the transcendentalist gospel of Emerson, Thoreau, and Parker. That in turn has given place to the faith in reason which most of us now share. Nor among Unitarians is there any definite agreement in the beliefs they hold. Incorrigible individualists, essential non-conformists, lovers of liberty, one and all, they think through their thoughts, stand squarely on their own feet, call no man master. In the average Unitarian congregation you will find theists and humanists, radicals and conservatives, mystics and hard- bitten realists, agnostics and devout believers. But one point of view unites them one and all. Servetus, Theophi- lus Lindsey, Channing, Emerson, Parker, together with heroes and prophets of a later day, all were in one respect, alike. All had one great characteristic.
They were men definitely and positively honest, having an intellectual integrity which guided and shaped all they thought and did. Passionately, wholeheartedly sincere, they dared to think things through, having the courage of their conviction, they absolutely refused to pretend to believe what they knew in their hearts wasn't so. Holding
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with the poet, "Dare to be true, nothing can need a lie," they have disdained all casuistry, hair-splitting definitions, quibblings, compromise with truth of any kind, daring to come right out and declare whatsoever seemed to them right and true. Rather than surrender their integrity, they have endured hardships, persecutions, ostracism, some- times death. Refusing to subscribe to creeds which they knew to be outdated, they have not only believed, but lived the scriptural injunction, "Provide things honest in the sight of all men."
Intellectual honesty, that is what Unitarian Christianity stands for, first, last and all the time. This is our primary excuse for being. So it was with the Pilgrims. So it still is with their church. And until this is insisted upon with equal courage and fervor among all churches, the battle of the Pilgrims is still not won, our battle still in process. The day of total victory is still far distant. The struggle that has truth as a goal and honesty as a method is still the vanguard battle of religious liberals, now as in 1620.
For though Christians are manifestly growing more brotherly, more liberal in many ways, still upon their minds the dead hand of the past rests heavily. Traditions count. Many denominations are stifled with an excess of what Carlyle calls "Hebrew old clothes," dogma long since out of date, language definitely archaic, creeds and cere- monies handed down from long buried centuries. These are repeated, practiced, accepted, and exalted as sacred and eternal. All of which has but one result. While un- questionably there are men and women who are sincere, there are thousands of other men and women, particularly among the younger generation, whose conformity is more external than genuine. Toying with their consciences,
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they "believe" in the Trinity, repeat the Apostle's Creed, with mental reservations, reading into its clauses meanings they were never meant to possess. Nothing can be much worse.
This habit of thought is altogether wrong. This dodg- ing of logic, putting up with half-truths, splitting of hairs, toying with conscience for the sake of expedience, is wholly dangerous. Harmless as it may seem, intellectual dishonesty is a deadly poison which affects all life, and if unresisted, eventually kills our better selves. The Pilgrims understood this principle, and were able to sacrifice all, go into the New England wilds, in order that their chil- dren, as Masefield said, could have a life in the soul. For the sake of the same principle we must fight the parallel battle for our day.
One of the worst evils in the world today is dishonest thinking. In politics, business, here and abroad, it is rampant. Nothing, I submit, is doing more to hinder the establishment of the reforms our world so plainly needs. And the evil, I firmly believe, is largely due to the intellec- tual dishonesty, conscious or unconscious, now prevailing among churchmen. Until these good people, daring to think straight, have the courage to look facts in the face, see things as they really are, being done with half-truths, subterfuges, casuistry of every kind, absolutely frank and sincere, daring to think things through, there will be little chance for the cleansing of our political life, the prevention of wars, and the establishment on earth of lasting peace.
Now, just here, in rendering this supreme service to humanity, the Unitarian Church can and must lead the way. We are a small body. Probably our numbers will never be great, for it hurts many people to think. Tem-
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perament, indifference, a willingness to bow to authority, a habit of following the crowd, all these combine to make them conformists. We claim, moreover, no moral or spiritual authority. We do not feel ourselves better than our neighbors. But we do claim one advantage. Our native wealth is honesty. A dishonest Unitarian is a con- tradiction in terms. Frankness, sincerity, straight-thinking, and plain righteousness is our rule of life. And we practice it in our daily living, not only on Sundays but on week- days, in our business and in our homes, at work and at play, constantly and bravely making our "yea, yea," our "nay, nay."
Always, under all conditions, hewing to the line, letting the chips fall where they will, we shall not only strengthen our own inner happiness, and the happiness of those about us, but set an example which shall be a challenge to the better selves of men everywhere, daring them to be loyal to the best they know; that the truth may prevail, and lies, falseness and insincerity be banished from the earth.
Thus should we all be proud, I say, that our fathers over a century ago, brought this First Church of the Pilgrims into line with the Unitarian movement. It therefore stands today in relation to the twentieth century in precisely the same position where the Pilgrims stood in the first quarter of the seventeenth century. It means that the Pilgrim congregation of today has not shirked fighting the same battle that the Pilgrims so gloriously fought in their day. Proudly we say that this Pilgrim church in Plymouth could not be anything but Unitarian. The challenge of our faith was stated for us by Lowell:
'Tis as easy to be heroes as to sit the idle slaves
Of a legendary virtue carved upon our fathers' graves;
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Worshipers of light ancestral make the present light a crime. Was the Mayflower launched by cowards, steered by men be- hind their time?
Turn those tracks toward past or future that make Plymouth Rock sublime?
They were men of present valor, stalwart old iconoclasts, Unconvinced by axe or gibbet that all virtue was the past's; But we make their truth our falsehood, thinking that hath made us free,
Hording it in mouldy parchments while our tender spirits flee The rude grasp of that great impulse which drove them across the sea.
New occasions teach new duties; time makes ancient good un- couth;
They must upward still, and onward, who would keep abreast of truth;
Lo, before us gleam her campfires! we ourselves must Pilgrims be,
Launch our Mayflower, and steer boldly through the desperate winter sea,
Nor attempt the future's portal with the past's blood-rusted key.
APPENDIX
Some Historical Notes on the First Church
BY FRED A. JENKS
A
THE FIRST CHURCH ORGANIZATION, AS FOUND IN THE BRADFORD HISTORY
So many therefore of these proffessors as saw ye evill of these things in thes parts and whose harts ye Lord had touched with heavenly zeale for his truth. They shooke of this yoake of antichristian bondage, and as ye Lords free people, joyned themselves (by a Covenant of the Lord) into a church estate, in ye felowship of ye gospell to walk in all his wayes made known or to be made known unto them, according to their best endeavors whatsoever it should cost them, the Lord as- sisting them. And that it cost them something this ensewing historie will declare.
These people became two distincte bodys or churches and in regarde of distance of place did congregate severally; for they were of sundrie townes and vilages, some of Notingham-
The Appendix contains material of a first-hand nature - material drawn from the records themselves, as well as reminiscences of an elder an- tiquarian of old Plymouth - reminiscences fast disappearing. The archaic spelling and phrasing of much of this section was left unedited in the hope that the flavor of the period would emerge for the reader.
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shire, some of Lincolnshire and some of Yorkshire wher they border neare togeather.
1606:
In one church (with must be ye subjecte of our discourse) besids other worthy men was Mr. Richard Clifton, a grave and revered preacher, who by his paines and dilligens, had done much good, and under God had been a means of ye conversion of many. And also that famous and worthy Mr. John Robinson who afterwards was their pastor for many years, till ye Lord tooke him away be death. Also Mr. William Brewster, a reverent man who afterwards was chosen an elder of ye church and lived with them till old age.
But after they had continued togeither aboute a year and had kept their meetings every Saboth in one place or other exercising the worship of God amongst them selves notwith- standing all ye dilligence, and malice of their adversaries they seeing they could no longer continue in ye condition they resolved to get over into Holland as they could which was in ye year 1607 and of which more at large will be said.
And so they journeyed first to Amsterdam, then to Leyden and here they settled after many difficulties, and here under the pastorate of John Robinson they enjoyed spiritual comfort though they lived but by their labor, and "became well weaned from the delicate milke of our mother country."
At last they determined to venture forth into a new and strange land that they might enjoy greater liberty even if it promised still greater sacrifice.
Thus the Scrooby Church was divided. The larger portion that stayed required that the pastor remain with them. The others desired Elder Brewster to go with them.
It was agreed that each division should be an absolute church, but agreed that if any of those that remained in Leyden should come over sea to them, or if any of the
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smaller church returned they should be considered mem- bers each with the other. The transfer of church member- ship by letter has ever been a part of congregational polity.
On the 21st of December there landed on the shore at Plymouth this little company, a congregational church, a civil body politic, and despite "that it cost them something" not one turned back.
They founded a colony and from out that colony came other settlements and within them, as well as within the parent colony, was built up the municipal government of towns. As freemen they organized, they held their meet- ings, town-meetings, they elected to preside at these meet- ings a moderator, and with the election of a moderator came also the warrant, both a part of congregational polity.
As freedmen they taxed themselves to pay town charges to build and keep in repair a meetinghouse used for meet- ings of the townsmen and as a place to worship God. The Common house first, then the fort built for defense and where their great guns were mounted, and here they wor- shipped God, sang his praises, preached his word, elected town officers, enacted wise and equal laws, until 1637 when their first meetinghouse was built on common land on the north side of Town Square.
This first congregation was followed by others. In 1630 there began the Puritan exodus to New England. Able preachers such as Higginson and Cotton led their parishes to this new country, and when sickness came Dr. Samuel Fuller of the Mayflower, pioneer doctor, helped the people of Salem, cured their ills, and also taught them the Pil- grims' ideas of congregational polity.
This exodus to the Massachusetts Colony continued. They came not as families but rather groups of families
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welded into a church organization under the hammer of adversity and the heat of persecution, and they built their homes around a meetinghouse.
The leaders in the government of the Province of Massa- chusetts looked with favor upon this manner of settlement. Grants of land were made to companies, congregations from Cambridge, Watertown and Dorchester churches settled the towns along the Connecticut River and helped to create a new state. It was a perfectly natural movement of the people and entirely logical that a meetinghouse should be built by a charge upon the people. The purpose, the need, and its justification was years later written into the Constitution of Massachusetts. See Art. III, Bill of Rights.
It appears to the writer that in the town of Plymouth the town's position as regards the church was much the same as that of the society at present. That even in the beginning the people had little sympathy with the idea of a bond between church and state is manifest. In 1633 when Mr. John Doane was elected and ordained as Deacon of the First Church he was voluntarily discharged as one of the Governor's Council.
B THE TOWN AND THE MEETINGHOUSE
How well the town did build, repair and sustain its meetinghouses is shown in the following transcript from the town records. Volume and page are given.
Vol. I, page 46:
Att a towne meeting held at the meetinghouse att Plymouth 24th of March 1661. Conserning the demand of twelve pounds
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by Richard Church and John Thompson in reference unto a former bargaine about the meetinghouse; the Towne agreed by a voate that they would not compound with the said plaintiffes; but will ansuare the tryal of it by law if the plaintiffes shall see cause to comense suite against the towne or any that have formerly bine theire agents about said bar- gaine.
Vol. I, page 52:
At a Towne meeting held by the Townesmen of Plymouth the 27nth of October 1662.
Capt. Southworth, John Morton, Stephen Bryant and Eph- raim Morton were appointed by the Towne to assist Capt. Willett in defending against Richard Church and John Thompson, plaintiffes against him in an action of the case to the damage of twenty foure pounds about our meetinghouse.
Goodwin states in his work, The Pilgrim Republic, that Richard Church was one of the designers and builders of the first meetinghouse.
Vol. I, page 143:
At the Towne meeting held at the meetinghouse at Plym- outh and 13th of ffebuary 1674. It was unanimously agreed and voated by the Towne that our meetinghouse shalbe speedily repaired att the Townes charge. And Mr. Gray, and Mr. Clarke were appointed and deputed by the Towne to take speedy course that the said meetinghouse be repaired and the Town heerby engageth to see the charge therof faithfully defrayed in such specue as they shall agree with men for the doeing of it; and that such pay as is due from ffrancis Combe, Jonathan Morrey, John ffallowell and Samuel Ryder, and all pay as is alreddy payed by them to the Townes agents; be improved towards the effecting of said worke; alwaies provided that the twenty seven shillings due in money to Leiftenant Morton be first defrayed out of it.
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