Quick Facts
Born:
December 10, 1741, Alton, Hampshire, England
Died:
September 3, 1815, Boston, Massachusetts, U.S. (aged 73)
Subjects Of Study:
salvation

John Murray (born December 10, 1741, Alton, Hampshire, England—died September 3, 1815, Boston, Massachusetts, U.S.) was an English Protestant minister and theologian who founded the first Universalist congregation in the United States. At first a Methodist, Murray sought to refute the Welsh minister James Relly’s unorthodox teaching that Jesus Christ’s suffering and crucifixion brought salvation for all humanity. Instead, he became convinced that Relly was right and began preaching universal salvation. After a personal crisis, Murray left both the pulpit and England. After arriving in the American colonies, however, his faith was renewed, and he began preaching Universalist theology in Virginia, New Jersey, and finally (starting in 1770) New England, where he spent the majority of his career. He founded a church at Gloucester, Massachusetts, in 1780 and subsequently preached in Oxford, Massachusetts, and Boston.

The Editors of Encyclopaedia BritannicaThis article was most recently revised and updated by Encyclopaedia Britannica.

Reformed church, any of several major representative groups of classical Protestantism that arose in the 16th-century Reformation. Originally, all of the Reformation churches used this name (or the name Evangelical) to distinguish themselves from the “unreformed,” or unchanged, Roman Catholic church. After the great controversy among these churches over the Lord’s Supper (after 1529), the followers of Martin Luther began to use the name Lutheran as a specific name, and the name Reformed became associated with the Calvinistic churches (and also for a time with the Church of England). Eventually the name Presbyterian, which denotes the form of church polity used by most of the Reformed churches, was adopted by the Calvinistic churches of British background. The modern Reformed churches thus trace their origins to the Continental Calvinistic churches that retained the original designation. The Reformed and Presbyterian churches are treated jointly in the article Reformed and Presbyterian churches.

This article was most recently revised and updated by Brian Duignan.