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Chapter IX, Parts I & II
“The Community Church: Organization, Message and Work”
by John Haynes Holmes
in New Churches for Old
(Dodd, Mead, 1922) pages 249-53
The distinguished John Haynes Holmes opposed the re-election of Samuel Eliot a President of the AUA, because he feared Eliot was creating a bureaucracy and a strong centralized denomination. Later, Holmes, an ardent pacifist, resigned his ministerial fellowship in the AUA when it strongly endorsed World War I. His disgust at Unitarianism no doubt led him to become an advocate of “community religion” through Community Churches, which he saw as a new and different kind of denomination.
The short document included here is the brief section devoted to organization.
- What might be the weakness of such an organization?
- Could such organization be a factor in the failure of the Community Church movement?
“The Community Church” by John Haynes Holmes is available here.
