WHAT MOVES US
A Tapestry of Faith Program for Adults
WORKSHOP 4: WILLIAM ELLERY CHANNING
BY REV. DR. THANDEKA
© Copyright 2013 Unitarian Universalist Association.
Published to the Web on 9/29/2014 11:51:55 PM PST.
This program and additional resources are available on the UUA.org web site at
www.uua.org/religiouseducation/curricula/tapestryfaith.
WORKSHOP OVERVIEW
INTRODUCTION
Nothing is so hard as to root out bad passions, to be upright, at whatever the cost, and to be benevolent and charitable under all provocations and difficulties. — William Ellery Channing (1780-1842)
This workshop introduces William Ellery Channing's Theology of Emotional Struggle and invites them to test the relevance of Channing's theological assessment of emotional struggle for our own Unitarian Universalist faith today. Channing has been called "the single most important figure in the history of American Unitarianism" and recognized as the man who gave "the liberal Christians of his day a party platform." He was the celebrated minister of the Federal Street Church in Boston for 39 years, and a renowned man of letters whose essays, sermons, and discourses during the 19th century sold more than a 100,000 copies in Europe and America. Channing affirmed human beings' kindred nature with God; he said we "know God through our own soul;" he celebrated our "likeness to God," and confessed he met "perpetual testimonies to the divinity of human nature." Channing's theology was a rational celebration of our rational nature. We celebrate his legacy to us as part of our rational liberal faith tradition. But we do not often peer behind his rational faith to examine his theological understanding that the route to moral perfection was through control of emotions. Channing believed that our ongoing personal, internal struggle to gain control over our tumultuous emotions, immoral feelings, wanton desires, and inappropriate physical passions strengthened our moral character. Emotional struggle, Channing insisted, was a major way to develop the moral perfection of our character. A spirit founded, in part, on the "crucifixion of selfish affections," Channing insisted, animates the "real beauty of religion" and all its harmonious sentiments, views, and desires. How do we reconcile the extraordinary positive message we take from his celebration of rational human nature as divine with his harsh pronouncements against his own unwanted emotional struggles and his harsh treatment of his own body that made him an invalid for life? What can we learn from Channing's theology of emotional struggle that is informative, insightful, and productive for faith development of our head and our heart today?
Before leading this workshop, review the Accessibility Guidelines for Workshop Presenters found in the program Introduction.
Preparing to lead this workshop
Read the William Ellery Channing entry (at www25-temp.uua.org/uuhs/duub/articles/williamellerychanning.html) in the Dictionary of Unitarian and Universalist Biography. Read Handouts 1 and 2 and Leader Resource 2. Use the questions that follow to help you understand the passages in Handout 2 and Leader Resource 2. You may wish to write your responses in your theology journal.
Handout 2
Leader Resource 2
Section I
Selection II
Selection III
GOALS
This workshop will:
LEARNING OBJECTIVES
Participants will:
WORKSHOP-AT-A-GLANCE
Activity | Minutes |
Opening | 5 |
Activity 1: Recalling Personal Experiences | 15 |
Activity 2: Introducing William Ellery Channing | 20 |
Activity 3: Personal Experience | 30 |
Activity 4: Critical Reflection, Testing Channing | 15 |
Closing | 5 |
SPIRITUAL PREPARATION
Read and reflect on the story, "William Ellery Channing's Struggle with His Unwanted Emotions," using some or all of the following to guide you:
WORKSHOP PLAN
OPENING (5 MINUTES)
Materials for Activity
Preparation for Activity
We are here to abet creation and
to witness to it,
to notice each other's beautiful
face and complex nature
so that creation need not play to
an empty house.
Description of Activity
Welcome participants. Invite a participant to light the chalice while you read aloud Reading 651 in Singing the Living Tradition, "The Great End in Religious Instruction" by William Ellery Channing, noting that this reading, found in our hymnbook is one of his most familiar writings, well-loved by Unitarian Universalists.
Invite participants to join in reading aloud the opening words you have posted on newsprint, "We are here to abet creation" by Annie Dillard.
ACTIVITY 1: RECALLING PERSONAL EXPERIENCES (15 MINUTES)
Materials for Activity
Preparation for Activity
Description of Activity
Introduce the workshop strategy using these or similar words:
Today we will use theological insights from the life and work of William Ellery Channing to help us focus attention on how we use our Unitarian Universalist faith to handle our own private, internal, personal emotional conflicts and struggles. Channing's theology was a rational celebration of our rational nature. We celebrate his legacy to us as part of our rational liberal faith tradition. But we do not often peer behind his rational faith to examine his theology of emotional struggle. Channing believed that internal emotional struggles strengthen moral character and help perfect the human soul's likeness to God. His own struggles here, however, destroyed his physical health.
How might you use your own internal emotional struggles to strengthen your moral character without breaking your physical wellbeing? How can we develop a positive liberal faith for both the head and the heart?
Invite participants to recall a personal experience from their own lives in which they wrestled with emotional turmoil and used a distracting physical activity to try to get a handle on their feelings. The experience might be a minor mishap rather than a major emotional trauma. Ask participants to recall details of the experience: Did they eat, shop, drink, watch TV, exercise, surf the web, work on a project late into the night, see a movie, go to a party? Allow two minutes of silence to give participants time to find their story.
Invite participants to think of what, in retrospect, they might have done differently so that they could have gained strength and insight from their emotional distress by addressing the source of their discontents, rather than getting lost in physical distractions. Allow a minute of silence for reflection.
Invite participants to form three-person breakout groups and share their insights of what they, in retrospect, could have done differently. Explain that each person will have two minutes to speak without interruption, followed by five minutes for small group conversation about insights they have gained from the three stories. Explain that you will tell them when to change speakers and when to move into conversation.
Watch the time and give signals when needed. After 11 minutes, invite participants back into the larger group. Invite them to share any further thoughts about what they learned about analyzing a personal emotional struggle in order to discern an insight.
ACTIVITY 2: INTRODUCING WILLIAM ELLERY CHANNING (20 MINUTES)
Materials for Activity
Preparation for Activity
Description of Activity
Project or distribute copies of Leader Resource 1. Briefly introduce William Ellery Channing as the "founder of American Unitarianism" and author of the 1819 Baltimore Sermon "Unitarian Christianity." Read or convey contextual information, using the paragraphs below as a guide.
Channing's 1819 Sermon, "Unitarian Christianity," brought Unitarianism out of the closet and helped Unitarianism emerge as a new religious tradition. In the sermon, he publicly affirmed what liberal Christians had been saying privately: He rejected Trinitarian dogma that made Christ equal to God and Calvinist creeds that demeaned the inherent worth and dignity of human nature.
Channing set aside the Calvinist image of God as wrathful, angry, and punitive, and rejected the portrayal of humans as irrevocably fallen, broken, and sinful. Channing insisted that God takes pleasure in making human beings happy and finds joy in encouraging the infinite progression of human beings toward the moral perfection of their souls.
Thanks in no small part to Channing, the affirmation of the worth and dignity of human nature became foundational for Unitarian faith. Human nature was now viewed as essentially sacred, perfectible, and moral. His essays, sermons, and discourses during the 19th century sold more than 100,000 copies in Europe and America. He gave the middle class a religion that affirmed what they personally experienced: progress, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness as a rational, sacred, and political right.
Distribute Handout 1, which contains more detail about Channing's life, and invite participants to read it at home. Call attention to the bolded text and invite participants to consider if and how the idea of human perfectibility is present in today's Unitarian Universalism and in their own theology. Distribute Handout 2 and read aloud the words of Channing, inviting further comment and observations.
Distribute the story, "Channing's 'Crucifixion' of his Unwanted Emotions." Say:
Channing believed that people could and should participate in their own moral progress, striving toward perfection as a being created in the image of God. In this story, we learn of some of his struggles for moral perfection as a young man. How do we reconcile the extraordinary positive message we take from his celebration of human nature as divine with his own harsh pronouncements against unwanted emotions and his harsh treatment of his own body which made him an invalid for life? What can we learn from Channing's theology of emotional struggle that is positive and productive for our faith today?
Invite participants, while listening, to keep their attention focused on the way Channing tried to physically develop and strengthen his moral character through a strict physical regime to control his unwanted emotions.
Read the story aloud.
ACTIVITY 3: PERSONAL EXPERIENCE (30 MINUTES)
Materials for Activity
Preparation for Activity
Description of Activity
Remind participants that Channing believed internal conflict strengthened our ability to make moral choices. He said, "We are tried as by fire, that we may come forth purer from the furnace. Our virtues are in peril, that we may hold them with a firmer grasp." (Memoir, vol. II, p. 33)
Invite participants to consider one or more of the questions you have posted and to write or draw their reflections in their journal. After five minutes, invite them to move once again into groups of three and share their reflections. Explain that each person will have three minutes to speak without interruption. Then invite each participant to offer, in one minute apiece, further thoughts and reflections based on insights they gained from listening to the thoughts and feelings of the others. Finally, invite participants to engage together in small group discussion. Remind them to be careful to express personal feelings about their own thoughts and insights rather than critiquing the thoughts and feelings of others. Ask each group to appoint a timekeeper so they know when to change speakers and when, finally, to move into conversation.
ACTIVITY 4: CRITICAL REFLECTION, TESTING CHANNING (15 MINUTES)
Materials for Activity
Description of Activity
Using the questions listed below, lead a whole group discussion about the issues discussed in small groups. Pay attention to the emotions named and discussed by the participants and keep participants' attention focused on these emotions. Remind them that Channing made emotional struggle a theological topic and a religious practice for Unitarian faith. Give participants time to reflect: Do not fill silences with verbiage. Allow participants to find their voice. As theologian Nelle Morton would say, "Hear them into speech." If you demonstrate comfort with the pauses and the silence as participants take time to find their feelings, thoughts, and thus their voice, participants will learn to do the same. In other words, model this practice as a Unitarian Universalist spiritual discipline of compassionate presence and deep listening. Remember, it takes longer to think and talk about emotion than it does to think and talk about ideas.
Tell participants that each person will be given an opportunity to speak before anyone can speak twice to the same point or question. And, remind participants they need only speak if they want to. Tell them that they are being invited to reflect on their own experiences, feelings, thoughts, and reactions. Whenever someone tries to enter into debate with another participant about a point, call the discussion back to first-person statements about one's own experiences. You are not moderating a debate; you are facilitating personal reflections as a small group ministry project. Ask:
Allow time at the end for each person who wants to speak to say something about their experiences doing the workshop. Keep this invitation as open ended as possible so that participants have the space to express what they feel. Do not comment on or try to summarize what has been said. Simply say "thank you," in an authentically compassionate and caring way.
Conclude by encouraging participants to continue to pay attention to the way they wrestle with conflicting emotions. Encourage them to do this work as a way of reflecting theologically about how their faith is linked to their feelings.
CLOSING (5 MINUTES)
Materials for Activity
Preparation for Activity
Description of Activity
Gather participants around the altar or centering table. Affirm the good work that participants have done in this workshop.
Distribute the Taking It Home handout. Explain that each workshop will provide a Taking It Home handout with ideas for continuing to explore the workshop's subject with friends, co-workers, housemates, and family. Mention that the Faith in Action activities included in the handout offer another extension opportunity.
Offer as a benediction Reading 592 in Singing the Living Tradition, "The Free Mind," by William Ellery Channing. Extinguish the chalice and invite participants to go in peace.
Including All Participants
Be sure to be inclusive of people with a variety of living situations—for example, living alone, with a significant other, in a multigenerational family, or with housemates—in the way you explain the Taking It Home activities.
LEADER REFLECTION AND PLANNING
After the workshop, co-leaders should make a time to get together to evaluate this workshop and plan future workshops. Use these questions to guide your shared reflection and planning:
TAKING IT HOME
Nothing is so hard as to root out bad passions, to be upright, at whatever the cost, and to be benevolent and charitable under all provocations and difficulties. — William Ellery Channing (1780-1842)
This workshop may have resonated with deep emotions or life-changing moments or experiences too tender to share. Find some uninterrupted time to journal, meditate, or take a walk to explore those tender times in your own way. How have those moments informed your faith journey? How have they led you to, or become woven into, your Unitarian Universalist faith?
Share your thoughts and stories with a trusted friend, a family member, your minister, or your workshop or small group ministry program. Invite others to reflect on their own moments of emotional struggle and ways their Unitarian Universalist faith may have helped them find spiritual regeneration.
Faith in Action
Pay attention to the feelings of others in any interactions where issues of faith or conscience come up. Make notes in your journal about what you observe and what you learn from this Unitarian Universalist theological spiritual practice.
WHAT MOVES US: WORKSHOP 4:
STORY: WILLIAM ELLERY CHANNING'S STRUGGLE WITH HIS UNWANTED EMOTIONS
Adapted from multiple sources, primarily the Memoir of William Ellery Channing with Extracts from His Correspondents and Manuscripts, in Three Volumes, William Henry Channing, ed. (Boston: Wm. Crosby and H.P. Nichols, fifth edition, 1851).
William Ellery Channing was born in Newport, Rhode Island to well-connected, but not financially prosperous, parents. According to Channing, his father was distant and aloof. He was, as Channing puts it, "a strict disciplinarian at home, and according to the mistaken notions of that time, kept me at too great a distance from him." Channing's mother could be, as one Channing biographer noted, "chillingly severe." Not surprisingly for someone reared in such an environment, Channing was "for the most part a grave and reflective" boy. As noted in the memoir compiled by Channing's nephew, Channing "was fond of lonely rambles on the beach; liked to go apart into some beautiful scene, with no other playmate than his kite... and according to his own statement, owed the tone of his character more to the influences of solitary thought than of companionship." But his loneliness was set aside when Channing went off to Harvard at age 15. There he made lifelong friends and joined fraternal clubs and societies. His life was bountiful with friendship.
After college, at age 18 Channing went to Virginia for a year and a half as a private tutor for the children of a wealthy slaveowner. The work relieved Channing of being an economic burden to his family in Rhode Island. His father had died five years earlier and his mother was left without adequate financial resources to care for her children. Channing's work as tutor also allowed him time to read in preparation for his subsequent training at Harvard for the ministry. His study routine was rigorous. He usually worked at his desk until two or three o'clock in the morning. Frequently, the sun would rise before he went to bed. When he did go to sleep, he often used the bare floor as his bed. This was his way of trying to overcome what he described as his effeminacy and his unwanted sexual fantasies. Once on the floor, he would spring up at any hour and walk about in the cold in an attempt to toughen his heart. Channing also experimented with his diet and did not exercise. As a result of these routines, he broke down his immune system and was infirmed for the rest of his life.
WHAT MOVES US: WORKSHOP 4:
HANDOUT 1: INTRODUCING WILLIAM ELLERY CHANNING
Information drawn from sources including:
Channing, William Henry, Memoir of William Ellery Channing with Extracts His Correspondents and Manuscripts, In Three Volumes, (Boston, 1851)
Wright, Conrad, Three Prophets of Religious Liberalism: Channing, Emerson, Parker (Boston: Skinner House, 1984).
Channing has been called the single most important figure in the history of American Unitarianism. His 1819 sermon, "Unitarian Christianity," gave "the liberal Christians of his day a party platform," [Wright, Three Prophets of Religious Liberalism: Channing, Emerson, Parker]. He publicly affirmed what liberal Christians had been saying privately: He rejected Trinitarian dogma that made Christ equal to God and Calvinist creeds that demeaned the inherent worth and dignity of human nature, effectively bringing Unitarianism out of the closet. Thanks in no small part to Channing, liberal Christians no longer hid their objections to an orthodox Christianity and Unitarianism emerged as a new religious tradition.
Channing preached, lectured, and wrote texts that insisted that God takes pleasure in making human beings happy and finds joy in encouraging the infinite progression of human beings toward the moral perfection of their souls. He set aside the Calvinist image of God as wrathful, angry, and punitive and rejected the portrayal of humans as irrevocably fallen, broken, and sinful.
William Ellery Channing was born into a family of the Newton, Rhode Island elite. His maternal grandfather was a signer of the U.S. Constitution and his father, who was the District Attorney for Rhode Island, entertained in his home such men as George Washington and John Jay, another signer of the Constitution.
Harvard-educated, Channing brought together in his theological projects the Enlightenment God of Reason, the Biblical God of Christian Scriptures, the God of Piety known through a spiritual change of heart, and the God of Providence who acted through business and government affairs to enhance human life on earth. In this way, Channing was the culmination of the American Enlightenment and at the same time the transition point to a liberal faith that would eventually remove belief in God, the Bible, Christianity, or Christ as a requirement for Unitarian faith.
Human improvement, for Channing, was a divine mandate. Thanks in no small part to Channing, the affirmation of the worth and dignity of human nature became foundational for Unitarian faith. Human nature was now viewed as essentially sacred, perfectible, and moral. Channing's essays, sermons, and discourses during the 19th century sold more than 100,000 copies in Europe and America. He gave the middle class a religion that affirmed what they personally experienced: progress, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness as a rational, sacred, and political right.
According to Channing, "The true happiness of man has its seat in the mind which God has breathed into us, in the enlargement of its powers, in the elevation of its sentiments, in the firmness and purity of its principles, in its ascent to its native heaven." Moreover, Channing believed that the religion he preached could help bring about "a moral renovation of the world." And as the years wore on, he expected "less and less from revolutions, political changes, violent struggles... from any outward modification of society. Corrupt institutions," Channing insisted, "will be succeeded by others equally, if not more, corrupt, whilst the root principle lives in the heart of individuals and nations; and the only remedy is to be found in a moral change, to which Christianity, and the Divine power that accomplishes it, are alone adequate."
WHAT MOVES US: WORKSHOP 4:
HANDOUT 2: LIKENESS TO GOD
From "Likeness to God," a Discourse at the Ordination of the Rev. F.A. Farley, Providence, Rhode Island, 1828, found in William Ellery Channing: Selected Writings, David Robinson, ed. (New York: Paulist Press, 1985).
In proportion as we approach and resemble the mind of God, we are brought into harmony with the creation; for, in that proportion, we possess the principles from which the universe sprung; we carry without ourselves the perfections, of which is beauty, magnificence, order, benevolent adaptations, and boundless purposes, and the results and manifestations. God unfolds himself in his works to a kindred mind. It is possible, that the brevity of these hints may expose to the charge of mysticism, what seems to me the calmest and clearest truth. I think, however, that every reflecting man will feel, that likeness to God must be a principle of sympathy or accordance with his creation; for the creation is a birth and shining forth of the Divine Mind, a work through which his spirit breathes. In proportion as we receive this spirit, we possess within ourselves the explanation of what we see. We discern more and more of God in every thing, from the frail flower to the everlasting stars. Even in evil, that dark cloud which hangs over creation, we discern rays of light and hope, and gradually come to see, in suffering and temptation, proofs and instruments of the sublimest purposes of Wisdom and Love.
WHAT MOVES US: WORKSHOP 4:
LEADER RESOURCE 1: WILLIAM ELLERY CHANNING PORTRAIT
WHAT MOVES US: WORKSHOP 4:
LEADER RESOURCE 2: MEMOIR OF WILLIAM ELLERY CHANNING — EXCERPTS
Selections from Memoir of William Ellery Channing with Extracts from His Correspondence and Manuscripts, In Three Volumes, William Henry Channing, ed. (Boston, 1851).
Here are three excerpts from Volume I of Channing's Memoir.
I.
My whole life has been a struggle with my feelings. Last winter I thought my self victorious. But earth-born Antaeus [giant from Greek mythology who drew strength from Gaia, the earth, his mother.] has risen stronger than ever. I repeat it, my whole life has been a struggle with my feelings. Ask those with whom I have lived, and they will tell you that I am a stoic. I almost thought so myself. But I only smothered a fire which will one day consume me. I sigh for tranquil happiness. I have long wished that my days might flow along like a gentle stream which fertilizes its banks and reflects in its clear surface the face of heaven. But I can only wish it. I still continue sanguine, ardent, and inconstant [sic]. I can still remember the days when I gloried in the moments of rapture, when I loved to shroud myself in the gloom of melancholy. You may remember them too. But I have grown wiser, as I have grown older. I now wish to do good in the world... . I must throw away those ridiculous ecstasies, and form myself to habits of piety and benevolence. One of the reasons why I dislike the rapture and depression of spirit, which we used to encourage at college, is probably this, — I find none to share them with me.
"The other day, I handed to a lady a sonnet of Southey's, which had wrung tears from me. `It is pretty,' said she, with a smile. `Pretty!' echoed I, as I looked at her; `Pretty!' I went home. As I grew composed, I could not help reflecting that the lady who had made this answer was universally esteemed for her benevolence. I knew that she was goodness itself. But still she wanted feeling. `And what is feeling?' said I to myself. I blushed when I thought more on the subject. I found that the mind was just as passive in that state which I called `feeling,' as when it received any impressions of sense. One consequence immediately struck me, that there was no moral merit in possessing feeling. Of course there can be no crime in wanting [lacking] it. `Well,' continued I, `I have just been treating with contempt a woman of active benevolence, for not possessing what I must own it is not crime to want [lack]. Is this just? I then went on to consider, whether there were not many persons who possessed this boasted feeling, but who were still deficient in active benevolence. A thousand instances occurred to me. I found myself among the number, `It is true,' said I, `that I sit in my study and shed tears over human misery. I weep over a novel. I weep over a tale of human woe. But do I ever relieve the distressed? Have I ever lightened the load of affliction? My cheeks reddened at the question: a cloud of error burst from my mind. I found that virtue did not consist in feeling, but in acting from a sense of duty"
II.
The love of God which the Scriptures call us to cherish, and which we are formed to attain and enjoy, is not a blind, irrational sentiment. It is founded on the clearest views of the understanding, on the abundant evidence we possess, that there is an Infinite Being, in whom reside wisdom, and power, and goodness, without beginning, or end, or any limit; who sustains to us the near and tender relation of Creator, Father, Benefactor, and Lord; whose commands are equitable and kind; and who is willing to pardon our offences on the terms of repentance. It is the offering of the heart to this best of beings; it venerates his majesty, esteems and adores his excellence, is grateful for his goodness, rejoices in his felicity and in the felicity of his creation, implores his forgiveness, resigns itself to his providence, and desires to do his will; and is this an affection to be decried and renounced? In the love of God are united the most delightful affections we exercise towards fellow-beings, -- filial love, thankfulness to benefactors, reverence for the great and good, sympathy with the happy, and universal goodwill. These pure affections all meet in the love of God; and are refined, exalted, and rendered sources of inconceivably high delight, in consequence of the infinite amiableness and superiority of the Being whom we love... . True love of God illuminates the darkness of the present life, and is a foretaste of the felicity of heaven.
... . "In considering the great happiness of possessing the Divine favor, I first observe, that they who love God must derive an inexpressible joy from the mere consciousness that they are beloved by such a Being, without regards to the benefits which flow from this favor... .
My friends, did your hearts never beat with joy, when you have seen the eye of a beloved and revered friend and benefactor fixed on you with tenderness and approbation; and can you be wholly insensible to the pleasure of him who feels the presence of God wherever he goes, and is able to say, `The infinite Parent of the universe is my approving friend'? Can anyone be so blind as not to see that here is a source of unfailing, or increasing happiness? . . . You who know not from experience the pure and joyful sensations which are here described, can you form no conception of the happiness of that man who looks round with adoring humility on the immensity of creation, on the endless variety of Divine blessings, and in the midst of his reverence and gratitude feels that the universal Parent, though encircled in his majesty, thinks of him continually, despises not his humble offering, is well pleased with his sacrifices of praise and love, and bears towards him an increasing, an unbounded affection? Are you so debased, as to prefer the sordid pleasures of sense, of the world, to a happiness so rational, so sublime? Can you consent to live without this delightful conviction, that the God who made you, the best of beings, delights in you as his children and servants?
III.
Have you not felt that you possess a nature far exalted above the brutes, souls infinitely superior to your bodies, souls which ally you to higher orders of being, -- that you are capable of knowledge, of goodness, of virtuous friendship, of intercourse with heaven? and has not an inward voice admonished you that you were made for this felicity, and has not this felicity excited some thirst, some earnest desire? Have you never felt that this intellectual nature admits to endless improvement, —that whilst the body grows for a few years, and to a limited extent, the soul has no bounds, —that you may enlarge your being, leave your present selves behind, and take a new rank in creation? Have you never lifted an aspiring eye to the eminence which has thus invited you, and been pained and humbled by your sloth, your low, earthly views, your reluctance to become what you might be, what you were made to be? and have you not, for a moment at least, spurned the bondage of your passions, and resolved to press forward to the excellence and liberty of children of God? Have not objects of a noble character, generous and useful pursuits, sometimes presented themselves to you, and brought with them the consciousness, that he alone is happy and excellent who gives himself up to them? and have you not blushed at the recollection of the narrow and trifling objects which have filed your minds and wasted your time? and have you not wished to live for something wider, for ends which embrace the best interests of others as well as your own? Has the thought of the great, good, and perfect God never come home to you with force? and have you never felt that he is the most worthy object of your hearts, that in forsaking him you are wretched and guilty, that there is no happiness to be compared with loving him, and enjoying his love and presence? and have you not felt some pain at your distance from him, some desire to return to your Father, some thirst after the knowledge and favor of this best of beings... ? Have you never looked into your own hearts, and shed tears over the ruin which you there beheld, over your disordered passions, your prejudices, your errors, your ingratitude towards God, your injustice and insensibility towards men? and have you not thirsted after deliverance from sin, after a better state, after that perfection, the idea of which has not been obliterated by human apostasy, and the hope of which is one of the first and most powerful impulses towards the renovation of our nature?"
WHAT MOVES US: WORKSHOP 4:
LEADER RESOURCE 3: CHANNING'S THEOLOGY IN THE CONGREGATION
This is a 30-minute activity.
Description
How does our congregation pay attention to our individual experiences of emotional struggle? Is the congregation a place where people can bring their whole selves, even when they are feeling less-than-perfect?
Reflect on your own experiences of emotional struggle, and consider the places where you found support. Sunday sermons? Pastoral counseling? Friendships? Small groups? Working on a service project? Consider the ways our congregation is effective in supporting people who are engaging an emotional struggle. What systems—both formal and informal—work well? What needs to be strengthened? What do we need to do more?
Consider how you could most effectively share your observations and suggestions with the congregation. It is recommended that you name the things that are going well and could be emulated and expanded, rather than list deficiencies the congregation should address. What people or group(s) within the congregation can best focus on the congregation's support for people at times of emotional struggle? the congregation's ability to embrace emotional struggle as part of each person's faith journey?
WHAT MOVES US: WORKSHOP 4:
LEADER RESOURCE 4: ENGAGING AS RELIGIOUS PROFESSIONALS
This is a 25-minute activity.
Description
Consider these questions as you reflect on the place of Channing's theology in contemporary Unitarian Universalism:
FIND OUT MORE
Channing, William Ellery, William Ellery Channing: Selected Writings, David Robinson, ed. (New York: Paulist Press, 1985). With special attention to "Unitarian Christianity," "The Moral Argument Against Calvinism," "Likeness to God," and "Self-Culture."
Channing, William Henry, Memoir of William Ellery Channing with Extracts from His Correspondence and Manuscripts, in Three Volumes, William Henry Channing, ed. (Boston: Wm. Crosby and H.P. Nichols, 5th edition, 1851).
Edgell, William Ellery Channing: An Intellectual Portrait (Boston: Beacon Press, 1955).
Mendelsohn, Jack, Channing: The Reluctant Radical, A Biography (Boston: Little, Brown, and Co., 1971), pp. 43-45.
Mendelsohn, Jack, "William Ellery Channing's Public Faith (at www.uuworld.org/2005/02/lookingback.html)," UU World, March/April 2005, p. 64.
Thandeka, "New Words For Life," A Language of Reverence (Chicago: Meadville Lombard Press, 2004), pp. 99-103.
Wallace, Herbert Wallace, "The Intellectual Background of William Ellery Channing," Church History, Volume VII (1938), Published by The American Society of Church History.
Wright, Conrad, Three Prophets of Religious Liberalism: Channing, Emerson, Parker (at www.uuabookstore.org/productdetails.cfm?PC=647) (Boston: Skinner House, 1984).