Orestes Brownson - Religious Unease

Religious Unease

In 1822, Brownson was baptized in the Presbyterian Church in Ballston, New York but he quickly complained that Presbyterians only associated with themselves, and that the Reformed doctrines of predestination and eternal sin were too harsh. After withdrawing from Presbyterianism in 1824 and teaching at various schools in upstate New York and Detroit, Brownson applied to be a Universalist preacher. Universalism, for Orestes, represented the only liberal variety of Christianity he knew of. However, Universalism also did not quell his desire for religious understanding. He became the editor of a Universalist journal, Gospel Advocate and Impartial Investigator in which he wrote about his own religious doubt and criticized organized faiths and mysticism in religion. Later, rejecting Universalism, he became associated with Robert Dale Owen and Fanny Wright in New York City and supported the Workingmen's Party of New York. In 1831, he moved to Ithaca, New York, where he became the pastor of a Unitarian community. There, he began publishing the magazine the Philanthropist. In it, he could express his ideas outside of the pulpit since he thought of himself as a better journalist than preacher.