Date: April 30, 2008 

Location: First Church Boston 

This lecture will introduce the subject. Why have Unitarian Universalists historically been associated with upper or upper middle classes? Drawing on Richard Niebuhr’s The Social Sources of Denominationalism, we will examine the choice of religion as it pertains to class. What is the relationship between economic success and salvation? Which side did the liberals take in the Great Revival of the 1740s, and what does that have to do with maintaining the social order? This lecture will also look at different kinds of class, such as education and economic. 

Mark W. Harris is the minister at the First Parish of Watertown. He is the author of the Historical Dictionary of Unitarian Universalism and of the UUA pamphlet "UU Origins: Our Historic Faith." He is also an adjunct professor at Andover Newton Theological Seminary and Starr King School.