Unitarian origins in Norway during the 1890s and early in the twentieth century

Abstract

During the latter half of the nineteenth century, the previously exclusively Lutheran Scandinavian countries of northern Europe became denominationally pluralistic. Until the 1890s, all the nonconformist denominations, with the exception of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, were forms of Trinitarian Protestantism. During the last decade of the century, however, returning Norwegian emigrants brought Unitarianism to Norway, initially to the capital, Kristiania (subsequently known as Oslo). Proclaiming their postorthodox religion (which has centred on ethics) through such conventional Unitarian means as periodicals and lectures, they appealed primarily to intellectually inclined Norwegians in the capital, but otherwise did not attract a broad following.