Unitarian Humanism, That Peculiar Animal

Integrity. The word comes from the Latin, integer, “intact.” Related words include integer, a “whole number,” and integrate, “to put together.” When a boat has “watertight integrity” it doesn’t leak . . . much.

Integrity is a feeling of psychological wholeness we get when our moral ideals matche our actions. It is the wholeness of inside and outside, as our metaphors for the body and mind would have it.

To state the obvious, this ain’t easy.

The February 1922 edition of the Christian Register, the national Unitarian magazine of the day, said, “To become a Unitarian member a person is expected to be true to the faith that is in him, and ready to serve.”

“True to the faith within” and “readiness to serve.” These were the requirements for membership, the touchstones. And they are a good key to integrity, besides—that inside and outside matching thing.

Integrity has long been a driving force in the Unitarian movement. The early “unitarian” ministers could not preach the doctrine of the Trinity and remain true to their inner knowledge. For them, this gulf between inside and outside was not integrity. Therefore they outed themselves as Unitarian and took the consequences.

Transcendentalist ideas also called Unitarians to face the question of integrity. Emerson gave up ministry as a result. Margaret Fuller refused the second-class citizenship of a woman in her culture and left the country. Thoreau went to jail. 

The congregation I serve, First Unitarian Society of Minneapolis, has identified as explicitly humanist since 1918, and was one of the first Unitarian congregations to do so.

Why, then is the congregation now Unitarian Universalist and Humanist, rather than independently Humanist or affiliated with the overtly humanist Ethical Culture Society?

The reason, I think, is that Unitarian Humanism is it’s own beast, neither Unitarian Universalist fish nor Humanist fowl, but a combination thereof. A combination that calls members to an uncomfortable sort of integrity.

Digging around in the archives at First Unitarian Society recently I found a pamphlet from 1933 called Humanism—A Religion for Today. That pamphlet contains these words:

“Unitarianism really is a spirit, an attitude of mind, rather than adherence to any specific doctrine or form. It is the spirit of open mindedness toward every problem, religious and otherwise, therefore no attempt has ever been made to formulate a statement of belief. Rather it insists upon man’s right to religious freedom in order that he may be unhampered in his quest for truth and the good life.”

OK. So. Is Unitarianism, as the saying goes, talking out of two sides of its mouth? The claim is that Unitarianism is about holding “true” to the faith within while staying open to new ideas. So it appears that there have to be some cracks in that wholeness, in the hull of that watertight ship, that let in some water . . .

Integrity, it appears, requires constant wrestling; it often requires changing one’s mind and actions.

That old pamphlet goes on to say,

“The average person, if of orthodox training, is at first skeptical of the value of a religion that has discarded all appeals to emotion and blind faith,—a religion, in fact, that invites only clear minded consideration of facts and does not require acceptance of set conclusions. Such a person may not at first understand a minister who does not ask agreement with his ideas, but is satisfied if he may lead his listeners to think.”

In the formulation of UUism, that’s “freedom of the pulpit” and “freedom of the pew.” We ministers speak our truth. The members of a congregation listen, bouncing these new ideas off their own truths and perhaps finding new ones. Or pitching them in the dustbin of history.

Whichever, in this formulation, integrity requires openness and change.

Sure, that’s hard for outsiders, the “average person” of “orthodox training,” as the pamphlet would have it. In fact, it’s hard for everyone in any congregation . . . all the time.

It’s a challenging tradition. Unitarian Universalists feel challenged, yet experiencing the pain that such a challenge entails is part of that wrestling with what is true and what needs to be done.

Staying afloat while letting just enough water in. It’s right for boats. It’s the very stuff of integrity. It’s the essence of that strange beast, Unitarian Universalist Humanism.