History

The Danish Unitarian Church was founded in 1900.

Before the Unitarians who fled Eastern Europe settled in England and Holland, they in 1660 attempted to get permission to come to Denmark. The Danish King, after consulting with the Bishops of the Danish Lutheran State Church, refused.

Unitarianism came to Norway in the late 1800's via Kristofer Janson who had been educated as a Unitarian minister in USA. The Norwegian Composer Edward Grieg became involved in Unitarianism, along with his Danish wife Nina. It was through influences from both Norway and England, that Unitarianism final made it to Denmark. Nina Grieg moved back to Copenhagen after her husband's death. She was a famous singer and pianist, raised a good deal of money for our church, and donated most of the money for the organ in our beautiful church building. The church was completed in 1927.

Unitarianism died out in Norway, most likely because of the rapid growth of Humanism in that country. However, it flourished in Denmark where it at first was hoped that the State Church would become liberal enough to encompass Unitarianism. At one point, there were three congregations in Denmark. Today the one in Copenhagen is the only one left in Denmark. There are now also small congregations in Norway and Sweden as well as Finland. The congregations of Denmark and Finland are members of the ICUU.

Our first Minister was Uffe Birkedal, who was a liberal theologian educated at the University of Copenhagen, where the emphasis was to educate Ministers for the Danish Lutheran State Church. At this time, our Church was clearly a very liberal Christian Church.

From 1918 to 1965, Thorvald Kierkegaard was our Minister, and his views were pretty much the views of the congregation. He was a very charismatic leader and had a great following, especially among the Upper Middle classes. Thorvald Kierkegaard was a Christian Unitarian before he took his degree in Theology from the University of Copenhagen. He was a close friend of Mary Westenholz who was the first President of our church. Westenholz was the aunt of Karen Blixen, and came from a very prominent family, which included some British relatives who were Unitarians.

After Thorvald Kierkegaard died in 1965, the Church had some short-lived Ministers who turned out to be more Liberal Lutherans than Unitarians. Being unable to find a minister who was both Danish and Unitarian, the members decided to become a Fellowship, and a group of younger people took over the leadership. Of these, the brothers Preben and Werner Bovin were the most prominent.

Preben Bovin was the President from 1971 and 2002, when Marianne Nørregaard took over. Werner was the V.P. until 1995 when Lene Shoemaker took over that position. Werner took over as editor of our bimonthly publication UNITAREN (The Unitarian), and was the editor until his death in 2003. The current editor is Tara Gregers.