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Information about New York Avenue Presbyterian Church

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The New York Avenue Presbyterian Church today
The New York Avenue Presbyterian Church in Washington, DC is a congregation of the Presbyterian Church (USA). The church has played an important role in the history of the United States during many crucial junctures.

The Scottish artisans building the White House worshipped on its grounds; they and their families formed a worshipping community that eventually merged with another to form The New York Avenue Presbyterian Church, located just three blocks from that original worship site.

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The Rev. Dr. Phineas Gurley, pastor of NYAPC, 1860-1868, was a spiritual advisor to Abraham Lincoln


President Abraham Lincoln worshipped regularly at New York Avenue Presbyterian Church during the American Civil War. Lincoln rented a pew for $50 a year.[1] Lincoln and the pastor, Rev. Dr. Phineas Gurley, developed a relationship in which they frequently discussed theology.[2] Gurley presided over the funeral of Lincoln's son, William Wallace Lincoln, in 1862, and then over the funeral of Lincoln himself in 1865. Rev. Gurley had an "insider's" perspective of Lincoln's faith, and reported it as follows:

I have had frequent and intimate conversations with him on the Subject of the Bible and the Christian religion, when he could have had no motive to deceive me, and I considered him sound not only on the truth of the Christian religion but on all its fundamental doctrines and teachings. And more than that, in the latter days of his chastened and weary life, after the death of his son Willie, and his visit to the battlefield of Gettysburg, he said, with tears in his eyes, that he had lost confidence in everything but God, and that he now believed his heart was changed, and that he loved the Savior, and, if he was not deceived in himself, it was his intention soon to make a profession of religion.


The Reverend Peter Marshall preached many famous sermons during World War II from its pulpit. (The original church was torn down in the 1950s and replaced with an enlarged structure which slightly resembles the old one.)

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Rev. Dr. George Docherty (left) and President Eisenhower (second from left) on the morning of February 7, 1954 at the New York Avenue Presbyterian Church; the morning Eisenhower was convinced that the pledge needed to be amended


The Reverend Dr. George MacPherson Docherty preached a Lincoln Day sermon on February 7, 1954 to a congregation that included President Dwight Eisenhower. The sermon, titled "A New Birth of Freedom," prompted the U.S. Congress to amend the Pledge of Allegiance to the Flag of the United States, inserting the phrase Lincoln used at Gettysburg, "under God."

Martin Luther King, Jr. also preached at New York Avenue Presbyterian Church during the Civil Rights struggles of the 1960s.

The current pastor (since 2002) is Rev. Roger J. Gench, formerly senior minister of Brown Memorial Presbyterian Church in Baltimore, Maryland.

External links

References

1. ^ [1]
2. ^ [2]
Washington, D.C.

Flag
Seal
Nickname: DC, The District
Motto: Justitia Omnibus (Justice for All)
Location of Washington, D.C.
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Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.)

Classification Protestant
Orientation Mainline
Polity Presbyterian
Origin June 10, 1983:
Merge of The Presbyterian Church in the United States and the United Presbyterian Church in the United States of America
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Motto
"In God We Trust"   (since 1956)
"E Pluribus Unum"   ("From Many, One"; Latin, traditional)
Anthem
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North façade of the White House, seen from Pennsylvania Avenue. Before construction of the north portico in 1824, the north façade looked similar to Leinster House shown in the picture below.
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Abraham Lincoln (February 12, 1809 – April 15, 1865) was the sixteenth President of the United States, serving from March 4, 1861 until his death on April 15, 1865. As an outspoken opponent of the expansion of slavery, he won the Republican Party nomination in 1860 and was
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American Civil War (1861–1865) was a major war between the United States (the "Union") and eleven Southern slave states which declared that they had a right to secession and formed the Confederate States of America, led by President Jefferson Davis.
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William Wallace "Willie" Lincoln (December 21 1850 – February 20 1862) was the third son of Abraham Lincoln and Mary Todd Lincoln.

Early life

William Wallace Lincoln was born about ten months after his brother Eddie died on February 1, 1850.
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Reverend Dr. Peter Marshall (27 May 1902 - January 26, 1949) twice served as Chaplain of the United States Senate.

Born in Coatbridge (North Lanarkshire), Scotland, he was a penniless immigrant when he landed at Ellis Island in New York in 1927 when he was 24.
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Allied powers:
 Soviet Union
 United States
 United Kingdom
 China
 France
...et al. Axis powers:
 Germany
 Japan
 Italy
...et al.
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The Reverend Dr. George MacPherson Docherty (born 1911) was a principal instigator of the addition of the words "under God" to the Pledge of Allegiance to the Flag of the United States.

Docherty was born in Scotland in 1911.
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February 7 is the 1st day of the year (2nd in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. There are 0 days remaining.

Events

  • 457 - Leo I becomes emperor of the Byzantine Empire.

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19th century - 20th century - 21st century
1920s  1930s  1940s  - 1950s -  1960s  1970s  1980s
1951 1952 1953 - 1954 - 1955 1956 1957

Year 1954 (MCMLIV
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Dwight David Eisenhower (October 14 1890 – March 28 1969), nicknamed "Ike", was a five-star General in the United States Army and U.S. politician, who served as the thirty-fourth President of the United States (1953–1961).
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The Pledge of Allegiance is a promise or oath of allegiance to the United States as represented by its national flag. It is commonly recited in unison at public events, and especially in public school classrooms, where the Pledge is often a morning ritual.
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Martin Luther King, Jr. (January 15, 1929–April 4, 1968), was one of the main leaders of the American civil rights movement. A Baptist minister by training, King became a civil rights activist early in his career, leading the Montgomery Bus Boycott and helping to found the
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Brown Memorial Presbyterian Church of Baltimore, Maryland, U.S., also known as Brown Memorial Park Avenue Presbyterian Church, is a large, Gothic Revival-style Presbyterian church located at Park and Lafayette Avenues in the city's Bolton Hill section.
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City of Baltimore
Downtown Baltimore

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Nickname: Charm City,[1] Mob Town,[2][3] B-more, Crabtown, The City of Firsts
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