If it was a practical rather than
a theological reason that caused Stoddard to adopt open communion, it
almost inevitably led to Arminianism, because it implied, as he presented
its conditions, that man is able of his own free will to accept the terms
of salvation which Calvinism had confined to the operation of the
sovereignty of God alone.
Another way in which the spirit of the time was showing itself may be seen
in the fact that the parish, towards the end of the seventeenth century, on
more than one occasion refused to the church the selection of the minister;
and church and parish met together for that purpose. This was the case in
the first church of Salem in 1672, and at Dedham in 1685. So long as church
members only were given the right of suffrage, the selection of the
minister was wholly in their hands. As soon as the suffrage was extended,
there was a movement to include all tax-payers amongst those who could
exercise this choice. In 1666 such a proposition was discussed in
Connecticut, and not long after it became the law. In 1692 the
Massachusetts laws gave the church the right to select the minister, but
permitted the parish to concur in or to reject such choice. During the next
century there was a growing tendency to enlarge the privileges of the
parish, and to make that the controlling factor in calling the minister and
in all that pertained to the outward life of the church and congregation.
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