Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1890-02-17
+" LIBERAL CHRISTIANITY. :"
REV. C. P. MASSEY ARGUES FROM THE
UNITARIAN STANDPOINT

Support of his DenominationaI
Position.
At yesterday g services of the Unitarian
Society Rev. c. P. Massey took for his text
Timothy iii, IS: 'All Scripture is given
by inspiration of God, and is profitable fol-
doctrine, for reproof for correction, for in.
struction in righteousness" He said
What l have to say to you this morning is
intended to enforce some general considera.
tions which have now come to be enter.
tanned in the world of intelligent thought
The time when liberal Christianity under.
took to do distinctively denominations
work, the time when it relied upon exposi.
ton, comment and controversy for its sup
port, is now happily far distant in the past
In the incipiency OF the movement, and
when the thought of the world was almost
universally controlled by considerations Of
literal Interpretation, of limited inspira-
ton, and OF local and exceptional miracles
it was hardly to be expected that liberal
Christianity even could have emancipated
itself from the prevailing consensus Of
opinion, and should not have sought by
appeals to the letter of the word, TO have
Disseminated its confession from every
other, and should not have done this with
the commendable desire of rearing a struc-
ture of faith that would find objective ex-
preston in material establishment.
But with the lapse of years the supposed
| integrity of many things upon which faith
was thought to be necessarily founded
came to be seriously questioned, and it was
| early seen that except as it confirmed some
belief made reasonable by a study of things
| in larger relations, no appeal to simply
| textual proof could be valuable for carry
| ing conviction to the candid and thought
| ful of the time whom it was especially de-
sirable to influence. 1 allude to these facts
| simply because l desire TO emphasize the
statement that except as these things dis
criminste US naturally from other religious
| bodies, making appeal to widely different
authorities for their support, We have no
controversy, and cannot be enticed into
one Adherence to one or another confess
| sion of belief has come among the intelli-
gent too largely to be attributed to differ
| ences of temperament, or taste, or educa-
ton, or surroundings, to carry with it ne
cessarily any credential of merit or badge
of dishonor Christian or Jew, Roundhead
or Cavalier, Protestant or Catholic, Calvin
| ist or Arminian Trinitarian or Unitarian
| indicate of themselves nothing of merit or
demerit, of honor or dishonor in the wearer
the scrutiny of the world searching beneath
all badges and confessions and formulated
systems, and denominational, and even
national and race distinctions, to test the
component elements of character in the
crucible of stern and impartial Judgment
In this larger Interpretation OF things,
and especially of our confession as not held
| by the limitations binding many other de-
| nominational beliefs, am prepared to ad-
vance the text as containing q helpful
thought in presenting the considerations
| desire to submit TO you this morning.
All Scripture is given by inspiration OF
| Gcd, and is profitable for doctrine, for re-
proof, for correction, for instruction in
righteousness. 1t is perhaps true that The
writer to whom these utterauces are
ascribed would have interpreted his in
struction in much narrower sense than
we are now supposed to assign to it. The
Hebrew who uttered or wrote the words
was doubtless man OF his time, Swayed
DIV the lTSQlllOES Vi Ills TGce, dUu WOIlu
have admitted no larger meaning to the
word scripture than that which defined it
as consisting of the sacred records of his
people. 1t is to appeal from this dis
| tlucdon that l present the words to
you now, to put meaning into them
which displays the providence of God in
more attractive coiors, TO make them serve,
| in partial sense, as the watchword of a
religious movement that cares less for its
distinctive UNCONVENTIONAL existence than
that it shall be either as an organized or
unorganized activity, helpful in rejecting
in its teachings the ascertained spirit of the
age, and so of dispensing what good it can
in the changed conditions which have over
taken the world.
Reverently refusing, then, to be bound by
the letter of tradition, as | have intimated,
we do not scruple to appeal from the man
of the first century TO the man of the nine
| tenth, and interpret the utterances of some
earlier proclaimer of truth as we believe
that he himself would have interpreted
them now. And we make this appeal pre-
eisely in the same spirit as liberal Chris
tianity appeals from Claiming of half a
century ago to Charming as he would
doubtless have interpreted truth to-day, if
he had lived to be taught by that later
knowledge which has modified so many
conceptions of sacred things. 1t is no dis
grace to ChanniDg that, living in the
earlier portion of the century, he did not
see truth precisely as do many who live in
| the latter portion of it; it is no disgrace TO
| q communion that so especially treasures
his memory, if approaching him for so
many things, it refuses to make him the
standard bearer of its present advance.
sliude to this particularly, because there is
a spirit Of marked unfairDess among those
unfriendly to liberal thong in deliberately
unfolding the opinions of those who at an
| earlier time were the honored exponents OF
liberal opinion, and implicitly binding
| their successors to support their every de-
Iiyerance under the penalty Of being re-
garded as apoState from essential truth.
1t is, then, in the desire to make the
| broaits generalization which can be made
| from what truth we possess helpful in our
work, tha. we proclaim the fact of all scrip.
ture being given b. inspiration of God.
| Taking the expression, however, out Of lis
received traditional sense, the question
naturally ccsurs, what may pe regarded as
scripture shieh has this stamp CT the civine
sfffa-us, and which can be made profita-
| hle for much IN the proper ordering
of life? II the spirit Of the age, the gen
| eral cor ersus of the higher thought OF the
! time. is 10 be considered, it must imme-
diately be seen that nothing that is local or
| srecial, nothing that fails TO meet The re-
| Guirements of abstract truth in It's mani
/ fold relations, can be estimated SIS bearing
lis credentials. Scripture is then at once
| limited 10 that when is found 10 be capa-
| bic Of universal application 10 truth which
| al hearts can appropriate to revelation OF
| facts that can be studied and made COM
! foriiug in every noble endeayor to sustain
| the neral lite.
| And now let me bring our understands
| ing ct lne ,ext into connection with cur
denominstioIal position and aciyity.
/ After our recent largely attended Confer
e. &c in Philadelphia, the New York Tlib
,tae having paid meTited tribute 10 the
I representative character OF the sssmblags,
over which the Hon. George w. Curtis
presided, ard especially TO the ability and
: accep;ed authority in many departments O
!. lfter,. fre of the gentlemen Whc spoke a