Author: Khoren Arisian
Born: 24 November 1932
Died: 14 January 2021
Bio: Khoren Arisian was born in Boston, Massachusetts, the son of an Armenian-born tailor. When he was seven, he moved with his family to Dorchester, Massachusetts, where his parents heard joined the Unitarian First Parish Church. He was drawn to philosophy, particularly liberal Christian morality, at an early age. He received a degree in History from Tufts University, then attended Crane Theological School at Tufts, spending his first year in Oxford, England. He finished graduate school at age 24, found a ministerial position in Iowa City, Iowa, where he remained for six years. In 1964, he was sent to be the first minister for the new Unitarian Church in Sarasota, Florida. He became involved in the Civil Rights movement, and he went on to join the Ethical Culture movement. In 1966 he became a Merrill Fellow at Harvard Divinity School, and was named Leader of the Boston Ethical Culture Society. In 1968, he joined the Board of Leaders of the New York Society. He co-founded the Ethical Culture School of Adult Education, as well as the New York Society's Prison Reform Task Force. In 1973, he wrote The New Wedding: Creating Your Own Marriage Ceremony. He returned to being a Unitarian minister in Minneapolis, where he remained for nearly two decades, until his retirement in 1997. Since his retirement he has continued to writing, edit, and publish humanist journals, and to lecture. In 1999, he returned to New York as a Senior Leader of the New York Ethical Culture Society, where he stayed until 2000. He retired again in 2005 and lives in Lambertville, New Jersey with his wife.