NOT HOW NEW BUT HOW TRUE
Liberals in Religion do not reject any orthodox doctrine just because it is orthodox, because it is old. Neither do they hasten to accept an idea just because it is new.
Not how old or how new, but how true – that is what they ask. Their quarrel is not with the conservative or the radical as such but with the dogmatist.
The tested truths of the fathers and the tested truths of the moderns – between these there can be no contradiction, and the Liberal welcomes them both as essentials of his faith.
Whenever anybody finds out the truth about any subject, he makes an addition to Liberal doctrine.
The Bell Street Chapel invites you to its fellowship. Its members do not agree to think alike but all alike agree to think, to exercise their reason and conscience in matters of faith, to follow the truth wheresoever it may lead them.
The principles of the liberal faith is set forth at
BELL STREET CHAPEL
Providence
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Below is a excerpt from a pamphlet published by the congregation in 1934.
The Religious Fellowship
Of Bell Street Chapel
Its Purpose – Its Nature – Its Message
The purpose of the Bell Street Chapel Fellowship is to deal in plain terms with the supreme things in human life as measured by the rational conclusions of science and history.
It is religious, not in the traditional, but in the ethical and scientific sense of the word – religious because it is an earnest and constructive movement devoted to the service of man in all that makes for the elevation and realization of his ideals.
This society has no fixed creed, because it recognizes the undeniable right of every man to think his own thoughts, and because it is unequivocally pledged to the support of truth as discovered by the growing intelligence of man. It has guaranteed to its minister perfect intellectual liberty, for the reason that to deny the teacher freedom to speak his idea of the truth is to deny men freedom to hear the truth.
The Sunday morning service is devoted to the work of educating the people to think for themselves, and to think rationally. No person can be free from political and religious oppression and corruption if he is either opposed to, or incapable, of free thought. This service, therefore, seek to lead people from the narrow, stilted, conventional path of humble submission to the authority of others out upon that broad highway where real men and women walk, with heads erect, fearlessly thinking out things for themselves.
The simple devotional service, with an address by the minister is held in the Bell Street Chapel, off Broadway, every Sunday morning at 10:00 o’clock. All persons who are interested in an intelligent faith and commonsense religion are invited to attend.
The Religious Fellowship
Of Bell Street Chapel
Its Purpose – Its Nature – Its Message
The purpose of the Bell Street Chapel Fellowship is to deal in plain terms with the supreme things in human life as measured by the rational conclusions of science and history.
It is religious, not in the traditional, but in the ethical and scientific sense of the word – religious because it is an earnest and constructive movement devoted to the service of man in all that makes for the elevation and realization of his ideals.
This society has no fixed creed, because it recognizes the undeniable right of every man to think his own thoughts, and because it is unequivocally pledged to the support of truth as discovered by the growing intelligence of man. It has guaranteed to its minister perfect intellectual liberty, for the reason that to deny the teacher freedom to speak his idea of the truth is to deny men freedom to hear the truth.
The Sunday morning service is devoted to the work of educating the people to think for themselves, and to think rationally. No person can be free from political and religious oppression and corruption if he is either opposed to, or incapable, of free thought. This service, therefore, seek to lead people from the narrow, stilted, conventional path of humble submission to the authority of others out upon that broad highway where real men and women walk, with heads erect, fearlessly thinking out things for themselves.
The simple devotional service, with an address by the minister is held in the Bell Street Chapel, off Broadway, every Sunday morning at 10:00 o’clock. All persons who are interested in an intelligent faith and commonsense religion are invited to attend.
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