3. They believed that the communities, as well as an individual, enter into a contract with God.
4. They sought religious freedom, but were unwilling to grant it to others. .
5. They emphasized the importance of having a conversion experience (knowing .
that you have been saved) (AP, p. 30) .
The Puritans were convinced that many of the church's beliefs and practices were wrong. They believed that they still had unnecessary ceremonies, rituals, and hierarchy/popery. "Popery, the Puritans believed, actually obstructed the ties between God and human beings, and therefore should be eliminated- (AP, p. 30). That is when a woman named Anne Hutchinson came into the picture. .
When Anne and her family first arrived, they were welcomed in with open arms mainly because of William's wealth and Anne's knowledge in herbal medicines, nursing the sick, and midwifery. Soon after their arrival, Anne started to slide into religious issues. She began her involvement with religion by using the only book available to her, the Bible. She had noticed that the male members of the church were meeting regularly after sermons to discuss the Bible, so she started to hold her own meetings for women in her home. The women discussed the previous Sunday's sermons at first, but then Anne .
page 3.
began telling them of her own beliefs, which were different from beliefs of the Boston ministers. "She was suggesting that the holy spirit' was absent in the preaching of some ministers- (D, p. 92). Her reputation as a skilled midwife attracted hundreds of women, and eventually men, to join her discussion group. Hutchinson preached that people could communicate directly with God without the help of ministers or the Bible. This contradicted what the colony's ministers were preaching. Local ministers taught that people could only find God by following the teachings of the Bible, and that they were the only ones who could interpret the Bible correctly.