Convers Francis was a Unitarian

Unitarianism

Unitarianism is a Christian theological movement, named for its understanding of God as one person, in direct contrast to Trinitarianism which defines God as three persons coexisting consubstantially as one in being....

 minister from Watertown, Massachusetts

Watertown, Massachusetts

The Town of Watertown is a city in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, United States. The population was 31,915 at the 2010 census.- History :Archeological evidence suggests that Watertown was inhabited for thousands of years before the arrival of settlers from England...

.

Life and work

He was born the son of Susannah Rand Francis and Convers Francis, and named after his father. His sister, Lydia Maria, later became an important reformer.

Francis studied to become a minister at Harvard Divinity School

Harvard Divinity School

Harvard Divinity School is one of the constituent schools of Harvard University, located in Cambridge, Massachusetts, in the United States. The School's mission is to train and educate its students either in the academic study of religion, or for the practice of a religious ministry or other public...

. He was minister of the Watertown, Massachusetts, Unitarian Church from 1819 to 1842. Francis taught Theodore Parker

Theodore Parker

Theodore Parker was an American Transcendentalist and reforming minister of the Unitarian church...

 beginning in 1832 and preached at his ordination ceremony in 1840. Francis encouraged Parker when his translations and books were not selling well. He wrote of his "astonishment at your labors and learning", but criticized the recent lack of interest in reading, writing "the cry is all for action—for doing something, not moping over books as they say". Both Francis and Parker joined the Transcendental Club

Transcendental Club

The Transcendental Club was a group of New England intellectuals of the early-to-mid-19th century which gave rise to Transcendentalism.-Overview:...

 in the 1830s, an organization which included members such as Ralph Waldo Emerson

Ralph Waldo Emerson

Ralph Waldo Emerson was an American essayist, lecturer, and poet, who led the Transcendentalist movement of the mid-19th century...

, Henry David Thoreau

Henry David Thoreau

Henry David Thoreau was an American author, poet, philosopher, abolitionist, naturalist, tax resister, development critic, surveyor, historian, and leading transcendentalist...

 and Margaret Fuller

Margaret Fuller

Sarah Margaret Fuller Ossoli, commonly known as Margaret Fuller, was an American journalist, critic, and women's rights advocate associated with the American transcendentalism movement. She was the first full-time American female book reviewer in journalism...

. Being one of the elders of the group, in fact the eldest member who was also a moderator of the Club, he influenced other members. Preaching at a time when Unitarians were breaking into sometimes-hostile factions in New England, he wrote that "the condition of things with us in the religious world is anything but pleasant... The cauldron is kept boiling, & all sorts of materials are thrown into it".

After 1842, Francis was Parkman Professor of Pulpit Eloquence at Harvard

Harvard University

Harvard University is a private Ivy League university located in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States, established in 1636 by the Massachusetts legislature. Harvard is the oldest institution of higher learning in the United States and the first corporation chartered in the country...

. His books and writings include Christianity as a Purely Internal Principle and A Historical Sketch of Watertown (1830). He died in 1863, one year after Transcendental Club co-member Henry David Thoreau died.

External links

• WorldCat
• http://www.alcott.net/alcott/home/champions/Francis.html