!!!
Here's a clue. Puritans: Trinitarian. Evangelicals: Trinitarian. Unitarians: not Trinitarian. This is SIMPLE. If you don't grasp this you have no business pretending to tell us about anything related to, well, any form of Christianity at all.
You've simply made the gratuitous claim that evangelicals are closer to Puritans than Unitarians and provided a link to a unitarian text that, apparently unbeknownst to you, supports exactly what I said.
I quoted it for the specific purpose of refuting your false claim that "the" lineal descendants of Puritanism are Unitarians. Which it did, conclusively. That issue is over. Now, you think it "supports" you because the guy that wrote it equated Unitarianism with individualism, rationality, and probably apple pie and motherhood (all of which the Puritans had). If you wish to accept that equation, fine, just be aware that you would logically have to either embrace Unitarianism or reject rationality and individualism.
The contender decides to make himself the referee as well the moment his own chosen source material is shown to contradict what he's been obnoxiously yelling about since the moment he arrived here.
Here, you complain about me supposedly making myself referee, while arrogantly asserting that you have "shown" the source contradicts me. No it doesn't. As I said above, it was for the specific purpose of showing the Unitarians split with the Congregationalists. They did. You can try to evade it, but it's still there. Now, the source does attempt to prove the Puritans were "really" Unitarians all along because... they weren't irrational, and weren't collectivists. And you pretend to take this seriously.
It doesn't take any presumption to declare you the loser. You've become tedious. Now, let me summarize your real argument: "The Puritans are EVIL EVIL EVIL EVIL EVIL, therefore anything bad said about them is true. I said they 'logically' became Unitarians, I said Unitarians were 'the' lineal descendants of Puritanism. This is bad. Therefore it must be true."
Yeah, you know why the unitarians are not trinitarian despite their strong puritan heritage? Cause religious institutions change and evolve! Does that change the fact that a present denomination is the lineal heir to a previous one in a previous period of time? Absolutely not! Nor does it mean that some other modern denomination, but simple virtue of sharing a single common tenet among literally hundreds of defining theological characteristics with the historical one, is somehow closer to that historical one than its direct heir. The trinitarian idea has been present in Christianity for practically as long as the religion itself has existed and has been variously subscribed to and rejected by all sorts of sects, denominations, and competing theologies, including hundreds of tiny and ancient factions,t of which most are now defunct. It's also believed by several of the big ones that have been around through the test of time (i.e. Catholicism). Does that mean that every single tiny fringe cult that also happens to be trinitarian is theologically identical or even remotely similar to Catholicism? Absolutely not. In fact, one major denomination that, though trinitarian, differs substantially in its notion of the trinity per the famed and disputed filioque clause is probably CLOSER theologically to Roman Catholicism than a large number of protestant denominations who share a near identical notion of the trinity with catholics.
I quoted it for the specific purpose of refuting your false claim that "the" lineal descendants of Puritanism are Unitarians. Which it did, conclusively.
No it didn't. Your passage ONLY stated that unitarianism diverged from congregationalism, another related heir of the old puritan religion, and did so sometime in the early 19th century, thus already being well removed from the puritan age itself.
That issue is over.
You keep telling yourself that if it makes you feel better. The fact remains though that you are the ONLY person on this thread who seems to have any substantial problem with admitting unitarianism's direct lineal descendency from the puritans. That is because it's a well know and common fact - one which you desire to deny for reasons known only to yourself.
Now, you think it "supports" you because the guy that wrote it equated Unitarianism with individualism, rationality, and probably apple pie and motherhood (all of which the Puritans had).
No - it supports me because the guy flat out said that American Unitarianism started with the puritans! Read it again, AJ. You would have to be either blind or willfully ignorant to miss it:
"Unitarianism was brought to America with the Pilgrims and the Puritans."
From that the entire thesis of that page's section on puritanism is that unitarianism is what puritanism evolved into once the english government removed the state from church authorities.
I see you are skilled at the art of scarecrow construction. Tell me - do they joust back when you charge at them?