Editing Religious humanism (section)

==Origins==
In the late 20th century the Humanist movement came into conflict only with conservative [[Christians|Christian]] groups in the United States {{Citation needed|date=March 2019}}. "[[Secular humanism]]" has become the most prominent form of organized Humanism{{Citation needed|date=July 2024}}. However, the American Humanist Association notes that it largely emerged from Ethical Culture, Unitarianism and Universalism.<ref>{{Cite web | url=https://americanhumanist.org/what-is-humanism/edwords-what-is-humanism/ | title=What is Humanism? | date=July 2023 }}</ref>

===French Revolution===
The [[Cult of Reason]] ({{langx|fr|Culte de la Raison}}) was an atheist philosophy devised during the [[French Revolution]] by [[Jacques Hébert]], [[Pierre Gaspard Chaumette]] and their supporters.<ref>{{cite web | title=War, Terror, and Resistance | url=http://chnm.gmu.edu/revolution/chap7c.html | access-date=October 31, 2006 | archive-date=August 16, 2018 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180816042215/http://chnm.gmu.edu/revolution/chap7c.html | url-status=dead }}</ref>

In 1793 during the [[French Revolution]], the cathedral [[Notre Dame de Paris]] was turned into a [[Temple to Reason]] and for a time [[Replicas of the Statue of Liberty|Lady Liberty]] replaced the Virgin Mary on several altars.<ref>{{Cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=KzbobUhvpf4C&q=temple+of+reason+notre+dame+baumer&pg=PA75|title=The Making of the New Spirituality: The Eclipse of the Western Religious Tradition|last=Herrick|first=James A.|date=2004-12-02|publisher=InterVarsity Press|isbn=9780830832798|pages=75–76|language=en}}</ref>

===Positivism===
In the 1850s, [[Auguste Comte]], the Father of Sociology, founded [[Positivism]], a [[Religion of Humanity|"religion of humanity"]].<ref name="Humanism as the Next Step">{{cite web | title=Humanism as the Next Step | url=http://www.americanhumanist.org/publications/morain/chapter-8.html | access-date=June 25, 2006 |archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20060614195856/http://www.americanhumanist.org/publications/morain/chapter-8.html <!-- Bot retrieved archive --> |archive-date = June 14, 2006}}</ref>  Auguste Comte was a student and secretary for [[Claude Henri de Rouvroy, Comte de Saint-Simon]], the Father of French Socialism. Auguste Comte coined the term "altruism".

The BBC notes "While atheism is merely the absence of belief, humanism is a positive attitude to the world, centered on human experience, thought, and hopes."<ref>{{Cite web | url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/religion/religions/atheism/types/humanism.shtml#:~:text=Humanism%20is%20an%20approach%20to,human%20nature%20and%20experience%20alone.&text=While%20atheism%20is%20merely%20the,experience%2C%20thought%2C%20and%20hopes. | title=BBC - Religions - Atheism: Humanism }}</ref>

===Humanistic Religious Association===
One of the earliest forerunners of contemporary chartered humanist organizations was the Humanistic Religious Association formed in 1853 in London.<ref name="Humanism as the Next Step"/> This early group was democratically organized, with male and female members participating in the election of the leadership and promoted knowledge of the sciences, philosophy, and the arts.

===Ethical Culture===
The [[Ethical Culture]] movement was founded in 1876. The movement's founder, [[Felix Adler (Society for Ethical Culture)|Felix Adler]], a former member of the [[Free Religious Association]], conceived of Ethical Culture as a new religion that would strip away the accumulated unscientific dogmas of traditional religions while retaining and elevating the ethical message at the heart of all religions. Adler believed that traditional religions would ultimately prove to be incompatible with a scientific worldview. He felt that the vital aspects of religion should not be allowed to fall by the wayside. Religions provided vital functions in encouraging good works. And religions taught important truths about the world, albeit these truths were expressed through metaphors that were not always suited to modern understandings of the world. For example, monotheistic religions were based on a metaphor of an authoritarian monarchy, whereas democratic relationships were now understood to be the ideal.

Initially, Ethical Culture involved little in the way of ceremony and ritual. Rather, Ethical Culture was religious in the sense of playing a defining role in people's lives and addressing issues of ultimate concern. Some [[Ethical Society|Ethical Societies]] have subsequently added a degree of [[ritual]] as a means of marking special times or providing a tangible reminder of humanistic ideals.

===United States===

====19th century====
Before the term "humanism" was ever coined or even thought of being integrated into religion it had existed in America in at least an ideological sense for a very long time. Groups like the [[Free Religious Association]] (FRA) which was formed in 1867 and other less radical groups mainly consisting of extreme forms of early American [[Protestants]] such as the [[Unitarianism|Unitarians]] and [[Quakers]] had existed from the first landings of the [[Europe]]ans in the [[Western Hemisphere]].

====20th century====

In 1915, a Positivist defined the term "humanism" in a magazine for the British Ethical Societies. Another Unitarian Minister [[John H. Dietrich]] read the magazine and adopted the term to describe his own religion.<ref name="Humanism as the Next Step"/> Dietrich is considered by some to be the "Father of Religious Humanism" (Olds 1996) particularly for his sermons while serving the [[First Unitarian Society of Minneapolis]], which has since been considered the "birthplace of Congregational Humanism".<ref name="auto">{{Cite web |title=Welcome to First Unitarian Society |url=https://firstunitarian.org/ |access-date=2022-09-11 |website=First Unitarian Society of Minneapolis |language=en-US}}</ref> 

In 1929 [[Charles Francis Potter]] founded the [[First Humanist Society of New York]] whose advisory board included [[Julian Huxley]], [[John Dewey]], [[Albert Einstein]] and [[Thomas Mann]]. Potter was a minister from the [[Unitarianism|Unitarian]] tradition and in 1930 he and his wife, Clara Cook Potter, published ''Humanism: A New Religion''. Throughout the 1930s Potter was a well known advocate of women's rights, access to birth control, "civil divorce laws", and an end to capital punishment.

The [[Humanist Manifesto I|first ''Humanist Manifesto'']] was written in 1933 primarily by [[Raymond Bragg]] and was published with thirty-four signatories. Unlike its [[Humanist Manifesto|subsequent revisions]], the first manifesto described a new "[[religion]]", and referred to humanism as a religious movement meant to transcend and replace previous, deity-based religions. However, it is careful not to outline a [[creed]] or [[dogma]]. The document outlines a fifteen-point belief system, which, in addition to a secular outlook, opposes "acquisitive and profit-motivated society" and outlines a worldwide egalitarian society based on voluntary mutual cooperation. Bragg and eleven signatories were [[Unitarianism|Unitarian]] ministers.

The [[Fellowship of Humanity]] was founded in 1935 by Reverend A. D. Faupel as one of a handful of "humanist churches" seeded in the early 20th century as part of the American Religious Humanism movement. It was the only such organization of that era to survive into the 21st century and is the first and oldest affiliate of the [[American Humanist Association]].<ref>{{cite web | title=Genesis of a Humanist Manifesto | url=http://www.infidels.org/library/modern/edwin_wilson/manifesto/ch2.html | access-date=May 14, 2006 }}</ref>

In 1961 ''[[Webster's Third New International Dictionary]]'' defined religious humanism as "A modern American movement composed chiefly of non-theistic humanists and humanist churches and dedicated to achieving the ethical goals of religion without beliefs and rites resting upon superstition."

====Today====

Some of the US-based self-described Religious Humanist organizations currently active include:

*  '''The Humanist Society''' (formerly the Humanist Society of Friends)<ref>{{Cite web | url=https://www.thehumanistsociety.org/history | title=Our History &#124; the Humanist Society }}</ref> (this organization has its roots in the Quaker tradition but today is not exclusively tied to that tradition)
* '''The Objector Church''' (founded in 2018 as an interfaith religious humanist community).<ref>{{cite web| url = https://couragetoresist.org/objector-church-announcement/| title = ''CourageRoResist.org'' "THE "OBJECTOR CHURCH" AND COURAGE TO RESIST" (Sept. 28, 2018)| date = 28 September 2018}}</ref>

Many larger religious bodies include significant numbers of members and clergy who identify as being of humanist persuasion. These groups include

* '''[[Unitarian Universalists]]''' – As many as half or more members of UU congregations have historically identify themselves as humanists when surveyed.<ref>{{Cite web |url=http://www.uua.org/sites/live-new.uua.org/files/documents/coa/engagingourtheodiversity.pdf |title=Archived copy |access-date=2016-06-24 |archive-date=2016-03-29 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160329060650/http://www.uua.org/sites/live-new.uua.org/files/documents/coa/engagingourtheodiversity.pdf |url-status=dead }}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |title=Humanist Unitarian Universalists {{!}} UUA.org |url=https://www.uua.org/beliefs/what-we-believe/beliefs/humanism |access-date=2023-03-14 |website=www.uua.org |language=en}}</ref> Humanist UU's are represented by the '''UU Humanist Association (HUUmanists)''' (formerly the Friends of Religious Humanism)<ref>{{Cite web |title=UU Humanist Association |url=https://www.huumanists.org/ |access-date=2023-03-14 |website=UU Humanist Association |language=en}}</ref>
* '''[[Religious Society of Friends]] (Quakers)''' – Groups within the Quaker communities that hold a humanist perspective include '''Nontheist Friends'''<ref>{{Cite web |title=Nontheist Friends Network |url=https://nontheist-quakers.org.uk/ |access-date=2023-03-14 |website=Nontheist Friends Network |language=en}}</ref><ref>{{Cite news | url=https://americanhumanist.org/paths/quakerism/ | title=Humanist Common Ground: Quakerism | newspaper=American Humanist Association }}</ref>
* '''Judaism''' – see [[Humanistic Judaism]], [[Reconstructionist Judaism]]<ref>{{Cite web|title=FAQs on Reconstructionist Approaches to Jewish Ideas and Practices {{!}} Jewish Reconstructionist Community|url=https://archive.jewishrecon.org/resource/faqs-reconstructionist-approaches-jewish-ideas-and-practices|access-date=2021-05-14|website=archive.jewishrecon.org|quote=Reconstructionism, which proposes a religious humanist theology, sees God as a power or process working through nature and human beings.}}</ref>

Seeking to clarify that the word "religious" in Religious Humanism is not intended to imply a theistic or supernatural belief component, [[First Unitarian Society of Minneapolis]], where Dietrich first used the term, has now rebranded the movement as "Congregational Humanism".<ref name="auto"/>

===United Kingdom===
The humanist movement first emerged in the UK as a religious "ethical movement" in the 19th century, with the [[South Place Religious Society]] in London being the largest "ethical church". The remaining UK ethical societies merged in the 1890s to become the Union of Ethical Societies, which was founded and presided over by [[Stanton Coit]]. Ethical societies in the United Kingdom had their heyday in the late 19th century and early 20th century, with hundreds still attending weekly Sunday services at the West London Ethical Society (now part of Humanists UK) and South Place Ethical Society (now Conway Hall) in London in the 1950s. But they did not persist in this form for much longer than that. As time went on, Coit believed it would be advantageous for humanists to consciously organise in church-like structures, and even to think of themselves as congregations as they did in the US, in order to be more appealing to people from a Christian background. But there was a difference of opinion within the movement as to how explicitly to project or emphasise that Ethical Culture was atheistic. Following Coit's tenure, much of his attempts to make humanism more "congregational" were swiftly reversed, and the trend went the other way. Both Conway Hall and the societies that made up the Ethical Union consciously moved away from the congregational model, becoming [[Conway Hall|Conway Hall Ethical Society]] and the [[British Humanist Association]] (BHA) respectively. The BHA later became Humanists UK in the 2010s.

In 2013, the [[Sunday Assembly]] movement was founded in London as a "godless congregation" which was described in some places as "church for atheists", filling the niche vacated by other humanist groups.

===Scandinavia===
In the Scandinavian countries, the popular Danish philosopher [[Harald Høffding]]'s positivist work ''Etik'' influenced the development of humanist societies, which in Sweden and Norway styled themselves as "human-ethical associations", alike the Ethical Humanists in America and formerly in Britain. In modern times, the religious humanist/secular humanist distinction has fallen away; Norway, [[Human-Etisk Forbund]] is the name of Norway's humanist association, but it is fully a part of the broader international humanist community, and uses both "humanetikk" and "humanisme" in describing its philosophy. In Sweden, the Human-Ethical Association rebranded as [[Humanisterna]] in 1999, dropping the congregational model as the British had done in the 1960s.

===Belgium===
{{see|organized secularism}}
Belgium is broadly divided between its [[Flemish Community]] ([[Flanders]]) and [[French Community of Belgium|French-speaking community]] ([[Wallonia]]). In French Belgium, as in France, the secular movement is more concerned with national political organising and manifests nationally as the {{Lang|fr|Centre d'Action Laïque}}. In Flemish Belgium, the group ''deMens.nu'' (Humanity Now) brings together local humanist associations who engage in a broader range of activities, including community-based work. As with Humanists UK in the UK, ''deMens.nu'' grew from the union of local liberal or freethought associations.