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.Theconvention meetings included the approval of credentials, reports, andsermons, approving new societies, and granting licenses to preach andletters of fellowship to clergy.After 1805 the New England Conventioncame increasingly to be known as the  General Convention. P PACIFISM.See PEACE.PAGANISM.This is a theological perspective that has become in-creasingly popular among Unitarian Universalists in recent years.PAINE, THOMAS (1737 1809) " 355The word pagan derives from the Latin paganus, which means coun-try dweller.Today pagan is identified with those who find their pri-mary religious sustenance in an earth centered spirituality.Paganismis influenced by ancient practices when people were closer to the cy-cles of the seasons.Because it has roots in pre-Christian times, it hasbeen unfairly characterized as false folk religion that was supersededby Christianity.Many of its practices were co-opted by Christians,especially in Easter and Christmas customs and rites.Paganism haslargely enjoyed a revival due to the influence of the women s move-ment.An adult religious education curriculum, Cakes for the Queenof Heaven, inspired many Unitarian Universalists to find strength andhope in female images of God or Goddess.This has led to additionaladult education curricula, worship services especially for the sol-stices and equinoxes and even the creation of entire congregationsthat centered their religious practices on paganism.Although Unitar-ian Universalism has a strong heritage of earth-centered practices, es-pecially evident in the Transcendentalists who believed, like the pa-gans, in the direct experience of the divine through nature, the wordpagan has only been commonly used in recent years.The importanceof paganism in modern Unitarian Universalism was expressed in the1995 bylaw change in the Principles and Purposes of the associa-tion, which added the following words as another expression of thesources of this liberal faith:  Spiritual teachings of Earth-centeredtraditions which celebrate the sacred circle of life and instruct us tolive in harmony with the rhythms of nature.PAINE, THOMAS (1737 1809).Known for his pamphlet CommonSense, a document that rallied the colonists to the cause of indepen-dence.His better known attack on the monarchy was also part of alarger belief in freedom, which was expressed religiously, too.Painewas born on January 29, 1737, in Thetford, England, northeast ofLondon.By the time he was 37 he had run away from home, lost twowives, his house, and every job he had ever held.In 1774 he decidedto remake himself in the New World and, with letters from BenjaminFranklin, embarked at the end of September.He became involved inpublishing and his Pennsylvania Magazine eventually became agreat success.Common Sense, a title suggested by Benjamin Rush,appeared in January 1776, and it proved dramatically prophetic in356 " PANTHEISMleading to the  free and independent states of America. In additionto the spark provided by Common Sense, Paine s letters on theAmerican Crisis appeared in the press during a difficult time in theRevolution and helped the colonists believe in their cause and thatin the end their triumph would be  glorious. Before Paine pub-lished The Age of Reason: Being an Investigation of True and Fabu-lous Theology (1794) in Paris, deism was largely confined to a moreeducated class.Paine endured some vehement criticism because itwas felt he spread heresy to the common people with this publica-tion.It was an attack on the authority of the Bible, but the argumentswere made so that everyone could understand.Paine had left America in 1787 to visit England, but he did not re-turn until 1802.Some people were not happy to see him return.Theseincluded Benjamin Rush, who said,  His principles avowed in his Ageof Reason were so offensive to me that I did not wish to renew my in-tercourse with him (Koch, Religion, p.135).The religious attackswere frequent in his later years, as his opponents often tried to associ-ate republicanism with infidelity.In 1804 he wrote,  Deism is the onlyprofession of religion that admits of worshiping and reverencing Godin purity, and the only one on which the thoughtful mind can reposewith undisturbed tranquility.God is almost forgotten in the ChristianReligion (Koch, Religion, p.141).Paine died on June 8, 1809.The re-ligious and political radical who also wrote The Rights of Man (1790),which led to his banishment from England, had a controversial life.PANTHEISM.A theological position where God and nature are con-sidered identical.Pantheism has traditionally been rejected by Chris-tian theologians because it destroys the distinction between creatorand creation.This is not to be confused with panentheism as it is un-derstood in process theology.Panentheism posits that the world ispart of God but does not exhaust the fullness of God.It is sometimessaid that the Transcendentalists are pantheists with their emphasisupon the presence of the divine in nature.Ralph Waldo Emerson isusually most closely aligned with the pantheist perspective.In TheOver-Soul he writes:  Let man then learn the revelation of all natureand all thought to his heart; this, namely; that the Highest dwellswithin him; that the sources of nature are in his own mind (Al-banese, Spirituality of the American Transcendentalists, p.104).PARK, CHARLES EDWARDS (1873 1962) " 357PARK, CHARLES EDWARDS (1873 1962).An important preacherfrom the middle of the 20th century who is chiefly remembered forhis long pastorate at the First Church of Boston.Park was born onMarch 14, 1873, in Mahabaleshwar, India.He was the son andgrandson of congregational ministers who served as missionaries inIndia, his father completing his term there in 1881.Park went toPhillips Academy in Andover, Massachusetts, and then to Yale Uni-versity, where he graduated in 1896 [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]