Bushnell, Horace (1802–1876)

US minister and theologian. One of his most influential works was Christian Nurture (1847). By the time of his death he had carved out a place as one of the most influential of American Protestant theologians with his emphasis on bringing religion into harmony with human experience and nature.

He was born in Bantam, Connecticut. After graduating from Yale (1827), he was teaching and reading for the bar when in 1831 he felt called to the ministry. He entered Yale's Divinity School; the rationalistic ‘new divinity’ of Calvinism then in vogue offended his more intuitive spirit but he accepted ordination in 1833, and although not truly a popular preacher he had a reputation for fine sermons. In 1849 he experienced a mystical vision of God and the Gospel; when he revealed this, he was attacked by the more traditional Congregationalists. His poor health, a recurring problem throughout his life, forced him to resign from a pastorate in 1861, but he continued to publish his sermons and religious speculations. His other books include Nature and the Supernatural (1858) and The Vicarious Sacrifice (1866).