Nature Coast Unitarian Universalists December 10, 2000

Lecanto, Florida

Unitarian Universalist Heroes #3

“Michael Servetus: Daring to Question!”

A First Person Sermon by Lloyd H. Dunham

Honoring the Father of Religious Tolerance

Some have called me “The First Unitarian”.

That isn’t exactly true

but when I dared raise questions about the doctrine of the Trinity

little did I know that it would cost me my life.

My name is Michael Servetus.

I was born in 1511

of noble blood

In Villanueva in Spain

We were a devout Roman Catholic family.

My brother was a Roman priest.

The Protestant Reformation had been underway for at least a century.

Nearly a hundred years before I was born

John Huss had been burned at the stake

for questioning the teachings of the Church.

If I accomplished nothing else in my brief forty-two years,

at least my death

shocked enough people

that religious tolerance became important to many.

In the years just before I was born,

Spain was a great bridge among Christians, Islamics and Jews.

But when the Inquisition came along

our country sided with Christian Europe.

Suddenly non-Christians had to decide between baptism

or exile.

When I was just a kid of fourteen

I was sent to work for Juan de Quintana,

a Franciscan,

from whom I learned a lot.

After a while he released me

to study law at Toulouse.

In law school I learned that denial of the doctrine of the Trinity

could result in execution.

I remembered the great and familiar words of the Shema,

”Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God is One.”[1]

Those are probably the most familiar

and most repeated words

in all of Judaism.

In those words and in all of scripture

I found no justification for the Trinity

and I could not understand why anyone could believe it.

The Jews were calling it “tritheism”.

My law studies got interrupted.

Quintana called me back

to go with him

as he accompanied the Emperor Charles of France

who was trying to “mend fences” with the pope.

I was only eighteen at the time

and I was impressed –

or should I say,

sickened.

There was the emperor

actually kissing the feet of the pope!

I couldn’t help compare

the opulence of the pope

to the poverty of Jesus.

It made no sense.

How humble Jesus was

but the pope was traveling in style

carried on the shoulders of his servants!

It wasn’t long after that,

that I “slipped away” from Quintana

as I was working hard at my own beliefs..

I was still a young man of nearly twenty

when I published my first book.

I called it

On the Errors of the Trinity.

I had a difficult time getting my book published.

I was refused in Basel.

Then I traveled to Germany

where I finally succeeded in Strassburg

on the condition that the printer and location be omitted.

You probably can’t even imagine the reaction to this book.

I was in mortal danger in Catholic areas.

There were some things that I wrote

that also angered Protestant reformers.

I had no place that was safe.

When my book got to Zurich

it angered the church authorities.

They thought it would “undermine all of Christendom”

if left unchecked.

They were giving me power I didn’t know I had!

I was just trying to stimulate discussion,

like Martin Luther before me.

Melanchthon called me “plainly demented”.

In 1532, when I was still only twenty-one,

the Inquisition in Spain gave orders

for me to be lured or forced back to Spain

so they could deal with me.

However as long as I remained in Germany

they couldn’t touch me!

They even tried to get to me through my priest brother Juan.

Both Catholic and Protestants were after me.

I wondered about seeking a safe harbor

by sailing to the “New Isles”,

to your land,

so as to escape all this trouble.

I decided it was wise for me to protect myself

by disguising my name.

I started calling myself Michael of Villeneuve.

It was a thin disguise

since Villeneuve was my hometown in Spain,

but it helped when I was in Paris

and other parts of France.

Ever since I first became aware of the hostility aroused by such issues

I pleaded for religious liberty.

How could there be honest inquiry

and open free discussion

without tolerance for differences.

The ruler of France could usually be counted on for protection,

though you have to remember

that could change with the political weather!

This was well before

the great French experiment in religious pluralism

honoring both Catholic and Huguenot

The situation in France soon become hostile

when the next king teamed up with the cardinal and the inquisitor

in a campaign to root out all heresy.

I had to contend with all three

in spite of my pseudonym.

I tried to live inconspicuously

in Lyon, France

where I worked as an editor.

I edited an edition of Ptolemy’s Geography

and Sante Pagnini’s Bible.

I wanted the Bible to be right

so I worked diligently for four years to complete the work.

I also earned part of my living

by lecturing on geography.

While I was on this job

my friend Champier encouraged me to study medicine.

By my thirtieth birthday

I was a doctor of medicine.

I was fortunate

because if I had been discovered for my theological views

I would have been banished or burned

in most every country of Europe.

This period of my life was relatively calm

until I got interested in astrology.

After all,

astrology was accorded credibility

both in medicine and in religion

in those days.

I stated my views in a statement I called

Apology for Astrology.

The faculty of medicine at the University of Paris took offense

and judged me to be a charlatan.

I wasn’t always creating controversy!

I was working hard at my medical work.

I had questions that grew out of my studies of anatomy

which led me to discover the pulmonary circulation of the blood.

It was a break through in medicine

when I was able to show

that the blood flowed through the lungs

to deposit waste

and pick up oxygen.

It is the only thing about my life

that gets me any respect –

and most of the world has long forgotten even this.

I announced my discovery in a work on theology,

It seemed right since I saw no real distinction

among the fields of theology, philosophy,

psychology and physiology

I came to believe that there was an area of divinity in all humans.

This idea came to me out of my study of anatomy.

Some of you have called this

“the spark, the seed, or the light”.

I called it soul.

And for me there was no sharp distinction between soul and spirit.

Once I was asked about my personal life.

To tell the truth I almost got married.

The more I thought about it

I decided it would be unfair to my partner

since I had serious doubts about my ability to father a child,

due to earlier injury.

Thus celibacy became for me a matter of choice and of preference.

From 1540 on for twelve years,

I lived a fairly quiet life in a suburb of Lyon,

combining my work as a physician

with my interest in editing.

Even then I couldn’t keep my views to myself.

I was hearing a lot from the Anabaptists

and I liked much of what they believed.

. I especially agreed with them on the subject of baptism.

Again these were things that brought them alienation

from Roman Catholic and Protestant reformer alike.

You probably know that

there was very little separation of church and state

in the sixteenth century.

In Switzerland the Catholics had controlled a number of cities,

especially Geneva.

But time came when the people threw out their Catholic rulers

and Geneva became a Protestant stronghold.

When this happened

I had hoped that the brilliant reformer John Calvin

might be willing to listen to what I had to say

and examine new perspectives

on some of the issues of doctrine.

Catholics and German reformers alike wouldn’t listen to me.

So I entered into correspondence with Calvin.

However I soon discovered that our differences

went much deeper than I had thought.

Calvin soon wrote a letter to his friend Farel

in which he said,

“’Servetus has just sent me,

together with his letters,

a long volume of his ravings.

If I consent

he will come here,

but I will not give my word,

for should he come,

if my authority is of any avail

I will not suffer him to get out alive.’”

What a disappointment!

I had been rejected in Rome, in Saragossa,

Toulouse, Basel,

Strassburg, Wittenberg –

and now Geneva!

Calvin never returned to me the manuscript which I sent to him.

Since it was my only completed copy

I was forced to take my notes

and other materials

to reconstruct the book I was working on.

When it was done

I again had trouble finding a publisher that would take it.

I finally found a printer in Lyon

who had no love for John Calvin

and who was quite ready to print

something that would offend Calvin.

We published a thousand copies.

A copy of this new manuscript got into the hands of Calvin’s friend,

Guillaume Trie.

In English you would call him William – or Bill.

Trie had a Catholic cousin in the city of Lyon

to whom he wrote about me.

He claimed the city of Lyon was harboring a terrible heretic

who deserved to be burned.

I have his lengthy letter of condemnation

if you wish to read it.

I was summoned before the inquisitor

but he found nothing against me.

Trie was embarrassed

and pleaded with Calvin to send him more evidence.

Calvin did so in a most unusual act for a reformer

who took strong exception to Roman doctrine.

He assisted a Catholic in the case.against me!

Somehow Calvin managed to deny his part in this.

Finally the inquisitor had the proof he needed

and I was arrested along with my publisher

and we were sent to prison.

A trial followed.

I had to be very careful about what I said in court.

During the days of the trial

I got quite familiar with the prison layout.

The jailor often allowed prisoners out into the yard

to relieve themselves at night –

and this provided me with my opportunity.

About four in the morning

I got dressed

and then put my night clothes on over everything else

and asked to go out.

Once out I knew exactly what to do to escape!

As soon as they knew I was gone

they mounted a massive search