History

First Church

In the summer of 1632 the congregation erected a rude meetinghouse, with mud walls and a thatched roof on State Street, and a parsonage for Reverend John Wilson.  The next year, the congregation called John Cotton as a teacher, inaugurating a long tradition of having a preaching and a teaching ministry at First Church.  A more commodious building was erected after this, on Washington Street nearly opposite the Old State House.  This building was destroyed in the great fire of 1711, which was “occasioned by one Mary Morse [a member of First Church] being in drink,” but a new building, the “Old Brick” served the church until 1808, when the congregation moved to a building on Chauncy Place (behind the present site of Macy’s in Downtown Crossing).  In 1868 First Church moved to its present location, at the intersection of Berkeley and Marlborough streets in Boston’s Back Bay.

The Boston in which First Church was founded was a church centered community and much of the early history of Boston is also the early history of First Church.  The Antinomian Controversy, in which Anne Hutchinson and her followers challenged the spiritual authority of the clergy in the name of the divine spirit to which they believed the laity also had access, was played out largely within the walls of First Church.  John Cotton was a ‘teaching elder’ of the First Church from 1633 to 1652.  He published The Way of Congregational Churches [in New England] in 1648 which became the basic document on congregational church polity.  He also wrote Ordinance in 1640 (the congregation’s song book) which was the first book published in North America. 

Many of the major cultural and political figures of early Boston were either ministers of the First Church or members of it.  John Davenport (who later founded New Haven), Sir Harry Vane (later killed in the American Revolution), Anne Bradstreet (America’s first poet, and wife of Governor Simon Bradstreet), were all associated with First Church. 

First Church was distinguished in the eighteenth century by the sixty year ministry of Charles Chauncy, who was famous for defending reasonable and temperate religion during the Great Awakening against what he took to be the irrational emotionalism of Jonathan Edwards.  Chauncy was the editor of The Salvation of All Men Vindicated (1784), a book claiming that all souls would eventually be saved, anticipating the founding of Universalism by John Murray a few years later.  Long before the formal beginnings of Unitarianism, the theology of First Church had become liberal and the ultimate transition to Unitarianism was smooth, but not formally completed until after the Civil War.  Chauncy lost his battle against musical instruments in church and shortly before his death in 1787 the church became the first of the Puritan churches of Boston to install an organ.

William Emerson, the father of Ralph Waldo Emerson (who was himself minister of Second Church), served First Church from 1799 to 1811.  He was the prime mover in the founding of the Boston Athenaeum, the Monthly Anthology and Unitarian leadership at Harvard University.  First Church gave scholarships to the young Ralph Waldo Emerson and to Henry David Thoreau to study at Harvard.  Rufus Ellis was the prime mover in the relocation of First Church from Chauncy Lane to Boston’s Back Bay in 1868.

The ministry of Charles Edwards Park, D.D. (1906-1946, emeritus 1946-1962), extended far beyond the limits of the parish.  One of the great preachers of this century, he drew large congregations and for many years taught homiletics and preaching at Harvard.  Park was known as the Grand Old Man of Unitarianism.  After Charles Park’s long ministry in First Church ended in 1946, Rev. Duncan Howlett began his ministry.  With both a law degree, divinity school degree and a strong conviction about liberal religion Dr. Howlett provided thoughtful sermons and reactivated committees.  With young children of his own he revived the church school and developed ties with the Unitarian Service Committee and organizations concerned with conservation.  As the church was moving ahead and taking a more active role, he was called to All Souls Church (one of the key locations of the denomination) in Washington, D.C. in 1958. 

Rhys Williams, L.L.D., D.D. served the Church for forty years from 1960 to 2000.  Under his leadership the activities of the parish were widely expanded.  The church was instrumental in the establishment of Hale House, a community for elders, and the John Winthrop Nursery.  The church played a role in civic and charitable projects throughout the region, and developed a close relationship with Emerson College and with area divinity schools, whose Unitarian-Universalist members frequently serve internships at First Church.  Under the leadership of Dr. Leo Collins, First and Second Church developed a reputation for musical excellence in a city known for the music programs of its churches.  This reputation continued under music director Dr. Brenda Leach. 

After a fire on March 29, 1968 destroyed the Back Bay church, the congregations of the First Church and the Second Church merged, forming the First and Second Church in Boston.  The new building, erected on the site, was dedicated on Palm Sunday 1972.  It is one of the few major church structures to be built in a downtown area of America in the 20th century.