Research Notes: Politics in the Pulpit
While many pastors struggle preaching to congregations that many not completely agree on social and political issues, this sermon from Joel Hawes suggests this challenge is nothing new.
Sometimes in the course of researching a historical topic, you find a document that seems so strikingly relevant to the present you have to pause. There is, as the ancient wisdom writer of Ecclesiastes says, “nothing new under the sun.” I have been ruminating on a sermon from Rev. Dr. Joel Hawes recently.
This summer I am researching Hawes, the tenth pastor of the First Church of Christ in Hartford, Connecticut. He served in this role from 1818-1861, and had an evolution of thought over the course of his pastorate. He began as a supporter of the American Colonization Society, which sought to purchase passage for free Black Americans back to Africa. He later adopted a more radical anti-slavery position, even identifying with abolition.
His church, however, did not evolve on this issue. As Hawes explained of his time with the anti-slavery society:
There was I, the president of a new and independent society, with some of the members of my church whom I most esteem opposed to me, because they thought, conscientiously, I was wrong, while I as conscientiously believed I was right. The only difference between us, I think, was, that they were afraid to be right, while I was equally afraid to be wrong. (Lawrence, 348).
Hawes experienced what many clergy today experience when they believe one thing, but their congregation believes another. How do clergy and congregations navigate differences of opinion productively? Often, they do not do it well.
Members of Hartford’s Historical Team identified a sermon that brought this tension and conflict to the fore during the course of Hawes’ pastorate. While I expected the sermon to address slavery, I was struck by how relevant many of Hawes’ other observations of the “tendencies of the age” were. It was a Thanksgiving Day Sermon from 1835. In addition to the question of slavery, Hawes was navigating a political climate and congregational politics that feel quite parallel to contemporary religious life.
Reading the Sermon
Reading Hawes’ sermon is rather difficult. While his handwriting is not bad by nineteenth century standards, I have been a little out of practice of reading these documents. I relied upon Trankribus, an AI-based platform that specializes in historical transcription, to generate a base text. From there, I fed Trankribus’ very rough transcription into Anthropic’s generative AI platform Claude to generate a more readable and polished text.
Transkribus does not produce a legible text. You can train the platform to better read your particular selection of texts, which is time-consuming and helpful if you are working with a larger body of texts. Claude, however, was able to take what Transkribus produced and generate a text that was quite close to actual text.
I took time reading the polished AI-generated transcription next to the handwritten document. Periodically, I had to rewrite lines of the sermon and change words here and there. While there were errors throughout, the AI transcription polished most of the text correctly. There remain places where I am uncertain of the text and have had to leave bracketed [?] for further consideration.
Be Patient
You can tell immediately that Hawes’ Thanksgiving Sermon was a departure from his typical approach to preaching. The text for his sermon was 1 Thessalonians 5:14—“Be patient toward all men.” He explained that the text was not the direct subject of his sermon, but a “lesson of great practical importance” related to the topics of his discourse.
He proceeded:
But at the present time, I feel disposed to digress a little from my ordinary course and invite
to directyour attention to some remarks which you are not accustomed to hear from this sacred place. It is not improbable that in the course of what I have to say, I may touch onsometopics which some of you may think had better be let alone, but should we differ on any of the points which may be brought into discussion, it will only furnish an occasion both for you and for me to put into practice the lesson of our text - be patient.
From the outset, he warned his congregation that this sermon would be difficult and it would require patience. It was going to address the most pressing “tendencies of the age.”
He began addressing what might probably be considered low-hanging fruit, or perhaps an easy tendency of the age to critique—the problem of worldliness and greed. According to Hawes:
…worldly men in this country are eminently in danger of perdition. The spirit of worldliness that is abroad in our land is bearing them on as a mighty flood in the broad way to death. Here is the great danger to which young people are exposed, especially our young men. By precept and example, by instruction and counsel, they are taught from their childhood up, that wealth is the one thing needful, and when they set out in life, they never think as a general part of prospering to themselves any high object or pursuit than to be rich and enjoy the pleasures of riches. This being their end and aim, they are quickly formed to a character of thorough going worldliness and go to swell that mighty tide which is sweeping over our land and every year drowning multitudes in destruction or perdition.
Hawes observed that in the United States circa 1835, individuals conceptualized the good life as a life in pursuit of wealth. Mammon or greed has and continues to be a driving force within the United States. I see this regularly with freshman undergraduate students who conceptualize their major and their life plan around professions that will make them enough money.
Partisan Politics
It was not just greed that Hawes sought to critique. Additionally, Hawes believed that partisan strife and party disagreement had too overwhelming an influence on the wider population. The focus on party had the tendency of drowning out the opinions and perspectives of individuals. He explained:
The spirit of clanship, of combination and party forms another striking characteristic of the age in which we live. Much is said of this as being an age of free inquiry. The shackles imposed upon mind and thought in former times, it is said, are thrown off and now every one is free to think and act for himself. Nothing is further from the truth…There is, at this time, much activity of mind, but it is activity excited and controlled by interest, by prejudice, by party. Even those who make the loudest boast of their freedom of thought…are for the most part the merest dupes and tools of some…chieftain of a clan. They think and act only at the dictation of their leaders. And in respect to other people,... there is a tyranny of opinion which very few have courage to resist and which in fact leaves very few to the freedom of their own thought or their own acts. Nearly the whole of society is broken up into factions and formed into combinations and clans, and all who belong to these combinations are restrained by the rules and are obliged to follow the interests of their party. If anyone quits the ranks and begins to act his privilege by thinking and acting for himself, he is immediately marked and measures are adopted to whip him into his place, or destroy his influence.
Hawes describes much of what we see in the United States today, a two-party system with rigid leadership structures and litmus tests that ostracize individuals who think differently.
He continued with what I thought was the most stunning parallel to contemporary United States politics. He addressed the lawlessness of the U.S. government. Preaching in the midst of Andrew Jackson’s Presidency, Hawes gestures to Jackson’s ignoring of the Supreme Court Case Worcester v. Georgia (1832). He expressed concern for the country when its governmental officers do not carry out the law.
Who has not been mortified and ashamed for his country? Who has not trembled for his own personal safety rights, when he has witnessed how fearfully in our land the government of law is prostrated and the government of riotousness substituted in its place? Who has not felt that he has fallen upon evil times when he has beheld those reckless combinations of men, called mobs, breaking out in every part of our land, composed not of the ignorant rabble, but often of intelligent men and led in some cases by the officers of government? Who has felt that himself or his friends are secure, when innocent citizens are seized and subjected to cruel punishments and to death even without the form of trial, when premiums are publicly offered for the persons or head of our fellow citizens, when the right of free speech is forbidden by lawless violence, when the privileges of the post office are denied a particular class of citizens and they are even threatened with being plundered or driven from the country if they continue to write or speak their own thoughts?
I am still quite shocked by this passage and its contemporary relevance. While I need to continue digging into what Hawes references with regard to the seizing of individual citizens without formal trials as well as the privileges of the post office, I am currently sitting with recent news stories about citizens being forcibly deported without due process and the increasing concerns over free speech.
This Issue of Slavery
I was expecting to find more on the subject of slavery, but for Hawes this subject was one among many problematic tendencies he saw in nineteenth-century US society. He referenced the moderate abolitionist Gerrit Smith favorably and stakes out a position at odds with radical abolitionists like William Lloyd Garrison. He rejected the idea that the North should keep silence about the decisions of the South. He suggested instead:
Shall the reproaches and clamor of some two or three solitary abolitionists turn away the wisdom and intelligence and good feeling of our country from this great subject and leave the tremendous evil of slavery to work its own remedy? This is our country ruined. If the North will reproach and refuse her countenance, determining to have nothing to do with the subject, and if the South will be jealous and refuse her assent and cooperation…[and turn]…into a passion when approached on the question, if good men and true
do not rise upthroughout the land do not take up this subject and bring to a consideration of it the best talents and best feelings, our hope is gone and we or our posterity shall reap the bitter fruits of our injustice towards man and ingratitude towards God.
Hawes’ perspective here makes sense given his opposition to partisan strife. He did not want his congregants to turn away from the question of slavery because they may have disagreed with the loudest and most radical voices of abolition. While the congregation had been strong supporters of colonization, Hawes was advocating for the importance of directly engaging in the question of slavery, whereas colonization had sought to indirectly address slavery through funding free Black individuals to return to Africa.
Congregational Opposition
It is clear that Hawes understood his congregation was not in the same place on many of the issues he addressed. He sought to establish himself as a “free thinker” and one who had the right to speak his mind, so long as he did so compassionately.
I am aware that I shall be blamed by some for having touched on these topics. I can only say that will not give me a moments uneasiness. I claim the common right of a man and a minister to speak my own sentiments provided I speak them in love. I am no party man; I follow no leader. I call no man master.
He concluded the sermon with a return to the scriptural passage “be patient.” As he worked to hold his congregation together after such a politically focused sermon, he acknowledged that congregants should be patient with him as he needed to be patient with them.
Should anything that has been said in this discourse ruffle the feelings of anyone here, from less regard to enter into the spirit and duties of the day, he will of course see the propriety of bringing home to himself the lesson of the text to be patient toward all men.
And should any remarks come to my knowledge respecting what I have said indicating that it was thought ill-timed and uncalled for, out of place or in any way adapted to disturb my feelings, I shall endeavor to have recourse to the same means of preserving my equanimity - to be patient toward all men.
Hawes remained pastor at Center Church for another 26 years. An initial glance at the historical catalogue of the congregation suggests the sermon did not cause any individuals to leave the congregation immediately, something that we might expect with contemporary church attendees.
Scholastically, I am fascinated by this relationship between pastor and congregation. Such a relationship is something that drives much of the scholarship in pastoral care, homiletics, and contemporary theological disciplines. Historically, I cannot think of much scholarship that considers this type of relationship and how clergy managed disagreements with their congregations, particularly on social and political issues.
From a confessional perspective, Hawes’ advice to “be patient” certainly resonates with contemporary strategies to combat polarization and conspiracists. His willingness to address a lawless government, political polarization, greed, and slavery are certainly prophetic words for his era. At the same time, such a plea invites criticism. Being patient is much easier when you are not enslaved.
It is difficult to evaluate the power individuals have and the best ways to wield that power. Had Hawes taken a more radical position, it is unlikely he would have continued to influence Center Church and the city of Hartford for as long as he did. There is also much to suggest that Hawes’ positions were genuine rather than calculated.
As I continue to investigate Hawes this summer, I need to investigate the individuals in his congregation with whom he likely disagreed. While I am assuming they were supporters of the Colonization Society, I am not certain. There are also additional sources from more radical abolitionists like Garrison who are uncertain of Hawes and his more moderate positions. More work needs to be done to situate Hawes in a complex network of New England Congregationalists and reformers.
This research is a reminder that tense relationships between congregations and pastors over sensitive social and political issues is nothing new. While such conflicts may be harder to find in the historical record, they exist as this sermon from Hawes demonstrates. Hawes’ continued service at Center Church throughout the rest of the Antebellum Period suggests that historically there have been ways to effectively navigate such challenges.
To read the sermon transcription in full, click here.
This post and its research are supported by the The First Church of Christ (Center Church) in Hartford, Connecticut.
Please like, comment and share as you are inclined. If there is a topic that you would like me to write about or if you would like to collaborate, contact me at abgardner2@gmail.com
Quite interesting, Andrew. I look forward to learning more about Hawes and how he handled being in a different place than his congregation.
About "due process", I wonder whether you read my latest Substack article on the subject?