A link to the Christian Universalist Association

[JasonPratt]

I was doing some research on another topic, and ran across mention of the Christian Universalist Association.

A quick search of our posts indicates they haven’t been mentioned here before. So…!

christianuniversalist.org/faq.html

One of the more interesting bits of information is that they consider members for ministerial positions.

I’m probably too hyper-doctrinal to be a good fit there–a few of the things they say worry me at least a little, which might be me being overly picky, but again that would tend to indicate I’m not a good fit, hm? On the other hand, I agree with much of what they say (obviously), and I like how they promote the organization as a way of avoiding a guru-cultlike status.

Anyway, it’s nice to see a serious organizational effort at the ministerial level being made. And other members or visitors here may feel right at home there, and might want to contribute to their efforts. So there’s the link to their official FAQ page!

(Wish we had an official FAQ page… That’s been on our list of things to get done for a while, btw, in case anyone is wondering.)

[Alex_Smith]

One of the more interesting bits of information is that they consider members for ministerial positions.

That is interesting.

I’m probably too hyper-doctrinal to be a good fit there–a few of the things they say worry me at least a little, which might be me being overly picky, but again that would tend to indicate I’m not a good fit, hm? On the other hand, I agree with much of what they say (obviously), and I like how they promote the organization as a way of avoiding a guru-cultlike status.

That’s pretty much the conclusion my dad & I came to. Possibly similar to TentMaker in some ways?

Anyway, it’s nice to see a serious organizational effort at the ministerial level being made. And other members or visitors here may feel right at home there, and might want to contribute to their efforts. So there’s the link to their official FAQ page!

I agree.

(Wish we had an official FAQ page… That’s been on our list of things to get done for a while, btw, in case anyone is wondering.)

Your request is still on my to do list and now that I’ve moved us to a reliable host, I might get a chance to look at it

http://www.christianuniversalist.org
Only 3 years old but looks very promising. Possibly a little bit too liberal for me to be completely comfortable but they have a lot of good things to say. What do you think?

Hmmm. They’ve got Unitarians on their board, and their creedal statement is very vague about the nature of Christ. That makes me suspicious. I really don’t want to support yet another sect.

I wonder why univeralist churches in the US first became unitarian, and then became humanist, and finally New Agey. I hope it’s not too a slippery slope. It must be very tempting to say, “God will save us all. Therefore, all roads lead to Heaven. Therefore Christ is but one spiritual Master amongst many.”

We must hold onto orthodox doctrines, maintain the centrality of Christ (he’s not just another teacher showing us the way to God), warn of the terrifying reality of aeonian punishment, and yet believe in God’s final victory (without becoming soggy, sentimental, or weak.) I hope it’s not too difficult a trick.

Hope dad doesn’t mind me quoting him

(mailto:info@christianuniversalist.org), I"]Dear Brothers and Sisters,

Today I came across your website and was encouraged by what I found. Unfortunately I’m on the other side of the world so it will be difficult to be physically involved and to attend things like The Christian Universalist Celebration 2010. However, at the very least, I want to encourage you to continue what you are doing!

Do you know of any Christian Universalist organisations anywhere else in the world? Ideally in Australia, where I am

I’ve been reading whatever I can find on Christian Universalism. What books would you recommend? I’ve just ordered Eric Stetson’s “Christian Universalism: God’s Good News For All People”. What do you think of Thomas Talbott’s “The Inescapable Love of God”? or Gregory MacDonald’s “The Evangelical Universalist”?

May God bless you all!

Cheers,
Alex

Disappointedly I didn’t get a response

[JasonPratt]

To clarify for people who haven’t been to their site: the CUA is open to dogmatic unitarians, as well as to trinitarians, and doesn’t seem to take sides at the organizational level.

By comparison, the EU forum was created mostly by trinitarians and was intended from the first to be a trinitarian Christian organization; and still has that character at the organizational level, even though our ranks of moderating officials are open to non-trinitarians including people like Jeff who aren’t Christian at all–the point being that they have proven themselves to be people who would be trustworthy as moderators. Also we like having representatives on the moderator team who may act as brakes against the majority of admin/mods. (It happens that we don’t currently have any dogmatic unitarians on the team yet, but that’s a historical accident; we have our eye on several unitarian members of good standing whom we will gladly invite to be moderators if our membership numbers grow to the point we feel like we need some more mods.)

However, they have people from the (so-called) Unitarian Universalist ministers on high-level staff; which is strange considering that they are elsewhere quite dedicated to distinguishing themselves doctrinally from the UUs, or from the typically UU-ish lack of doctrinality perhaps.

This would be less of a concern for me if they didn’t also go pretty far out of their way on a regular basis to decry the concepts of “orthodoxy” and “doctrine”. I might could understand the UU staff being ministers who, within the huge floppy tent of the UU establishment, were significantly more doctrinal. (That’s possible, right…? I’ve heard some ironic tales from reputable and even sympathetic sources of how dogmatic they can be about totally avoiding doctrine… ) But then there’s the generally anti-doctrinal stance of the organization. So…

I dunno. I don’t want to rag on them. I don’t think they and I would be good matches for each other, but other people here might be much more at home with them than I would be.

So I still think it’s a good idea to provide the info for people to check into for themselves. Especially since they offer an international ministerial organization (small though it may be.)