The Rev. Dr. Sheryl Kujawa-Holbrook was nominated and confirmed as 14^th Historiographer of The Episcopal Church by the 81^st General Convention meeting in June 2024. Editor of the Historical Society of the Episcopal Church’s peer-reviewed journal, Anglican and Episcopal History, she has been an Episcopal priest since 1985, currently in the Diocese of Los Angeles and formerly in Massachusetts. She is Professor of Practical Theology and Christian History at Claremont School of Theology and Professor of Anglican Studies, emerita, at Bloy House, the Episcopal School of Theology at Los Angeles. She is a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society.

The office of Historiographer was established in 1838 when it was recognized records of the church’s founding were being lost. The directive then was to prepare “from the most original sources now extant” a faithful Ecclesiastical History to the formation of the Episcopal Church. The duties go beyond writing history and include studying historical documents, methods and writings of other historians. At the root of the position, a historiographer is charged with keeping history alive.

“This is a time when there is a great deal of historical research across the church as parishes, dioceses, schools, and other commissions and institutions investigate their histories and address long-standing issues like involvement in enslavement and in residential schools to raise lost voices and begin working toward authentic reconciliation and reparations,” Kujawa-Holbrook shared in a recent interview. “My interest in history is based on moments of connection when our ancestors speak to us from the past, and it is up to us if we learn from their experiences to interrupt damaging cycles or even celebrate significant breakthroughs. I believe that historical consciousness is integral to the exercise of ministry.”

Following the resignation of Dr. R. Bruce Mullin, who served in the position from 2012-2022, the House of Bishops made no nomination an under Canon I.1.5.d., the Historiographer became the Registrar of The Episcopal Church. This was the Rev. Dr. Canon Michael Barlowe who served until Kujawa-Holbrook was confirmed in 2024. A list of previous historiographers is at hsec.us/List-Historiographers.

Kujawa-Holbrook holds several academic degrees, including an M.T.S. in Church History and Women's Studies in Religion from Harvard Divinity School and Ph.D. in Christian History from Boston College. She has been active as a teacher, scholar, and historian for almost 40 years, authored dozens of books and numerous articles and reviews in academic journals and church publications. She was Suzanne Radley Hiatt Professor of Feminist Pastoral Theology and Church History at Episcopal Divinity School from 1998-2009 and its Academic Dean from 2005-2009.

Dr. J. Michael Utzinger, President of the Historical Society, notes “it has been a pleasure working with Sheryl as editor of our journal. The gifts and abilities she brings to serve as Historiographer of the Episcopal Church will be a blessing in helping all of us to share our stories and remember our history.”

Kujawa-Holbrook is an associate of the Society of St. John the Evangelist in Cambridge, Massachusetts. She lives in California with her husband Paul, daughter Rachel, and cats Xander and Brady. She sees “the role of a historiographer as based on connection. The Episcopal Church has many gifted historians, archivists, librarians, and historiographers. I hope we can use this time of rich historical activity to further ministry and inform the church's mission in the future. I am always interested in learning more about historical projects.” Contact her at HistoriographerTEC@gmail.com.

The Historical Society of the Episcopal Church announced $14,000 in grant awards to 14 recipients at its Annual Meeting on July 31, 2024. Grant funds support research, publication and projects related to preserving and sharing the history of the Episcopal Church and churches of the Anglican Communion. Over $400,000 in grants have been awarded since the inception of the grants program in 1988.

Applications are considered by the Grants and Research Committee then awarded by the Board of Directors. Grants are made from budgeted funds. Additional grants were made from proceeds of the 2023 Advent Appeal to members of the Historical Society. Award recipients are encouraged to share the research and projects, especially in the peer-reviewed, quarterly journal of the Society, Anglican and Episcopal History. Details about the grant program may be found at hsec.us/grants.

Recipients with their areas of awarded research are:

• Tucker Adkins, a postdoctoral student at Calvin College, for researching and editing the journals of William Seward with David Ceri Jones.
• Christopher Arnold, a doctoral student at Syracuse University, for studying the papers of Emmett Jarrett, the first Anglican to lead a Catholic Worker intentional community.
• Mikkaela Bailey, a doctoral student at the Catholic University of America, for doctoral research on late medieval guilds in England.
• Tyson House, the Episcopal and Lutheran ministry at the University of Tennessee-Knoxville, for digitization work of their historical records.
• Christian Clement-Schlimm, doctoral student at Wycliffe College, University of Toronto, for doctoral research in England on Edward Bickersteth.
• Robert Flanagan, chaplain at General Theological seminary, to defray the costs of researching and publishing an edited collection of essays on Phillips Brooks.
• Neil Fleming, faculty member at the University of Warcester, for a research trip to Lambeth Palace Library to study archival material on relations between the Church of England and the Church of the East after World War I.
• Alan Guenther, faculty member at Briercrest College, for archival research in England Ram Chandra Bose, a late-nineteenth century evangelist in North India and advocate of episcopacy.
• Marianna Klaiman, independent scholar, for continuing research on ecclesiastical textiles in New York.
• Matthew Lukens, chaplain at the Episcopal Student Foundation/Canterbury House at the University of Michigan, for oral history research and interviewing on Canterbury House.
• Cameron Nations, D.Min student at Sewanee, for research on the ministry of John Claypool.
• Samuel Richards, social science and history teacher at the International School of Kenya, for research on how colonial clergy responded to violence in the Kenya Colony perpetrated during the Kenyan War for Independence.
• Anthony Sammarco, independent scholar, for research on the history of the Church of the Holy Spirit in Mattapan, Massachusetts.
• Phil Sinitiere, Scholar in Residence at the W.E.B. Du Bois Center, University of Massachusetts Amherst, for research on the Rev. William Howard Melish and civil rights at the Church of the Holy Spirit, Brooklyn.

The Historical Society of the Episcopal Church announces the Rev. Dr. John D. Alexander as recipient of the 2024 Nelson R. Burr Prize. Alexander is a retired priest of the Diocese of Rhode Island, who received a Ph.D. in Christian Social Ethics from Boston University in 2014. The honor is made for the article ‘Christ Church, Providence, 1839-1851: An African American Parish in Antebellum Rhode Island’, published in the September 2023 issue of Anglican and Episcopal History (Volume 92, No. 3). The Publications Committee was impressed by the depth of Dr. Alexander’s research and scholarship.

The article, which focuses on the beginning of Alexander Crummell’s remarkable and multi-faceted career, sheds important light not only on the history of the short-lived New England parish where Crummell served as rector, but also on the overall position of African Americans within both the Episcopal Church and American society in the mid-nineteenth century. The committee was particularly appreciative of Dr. Alexander’s willingness to extend his narrative beyond the internal affairs of a single parish, placing the history of Christ Church, Providence, within the much larger context of political events in Rhode Island during the tumultuous period before the Civil War

The Burr prize honors the renowned scholar Nelson R. Burr, whose two-volume A Critical Bibliography of Religion in America (1961) and other works constitute landmarks in the field of religious historiography. A committee considers all articles for the year to determine an author of the most outstanding article in the quarterly, peer-reviewed journal. The award recognizes that which best exemplifies excellence and innovative scholarship in the field of Anglican and Episcopal history.

The Committee also conferred an “Honorable Mention” on John Saillant’s article, ‘A Black Woman’s Baptism in the Episcopal Church: Prudence Gabriel in an Hour of Crisis, 1812’ published in the December 2023 issue. Dr. Saillant is a Professor of English and History at Western Michigan University. Similar in many ways to Dr. Alexander’s article, Dr. Saillant’s extensively researched essay deserves commendation for its ambitious analysis of the baptism of an African American woman in a Rhode Island Episcopal parish, interpreting that event as a paradigm of broader religious and social changes sweeping across the United States in the early nineteenth century.

Copies of articles of Burr Prize recipients may be found at hsec.us/Nelson-Burr-Prize or a printed copy may be secured by contacting Matthew. P. Payne, Director of Operations of the Society at mpayne@hsec.us or (920) 383-1910.

Anglican and Episcopal History offers scholars and history buffs over 20 scholarly reviews in its summer issue. The June issue, focused on the 50th anniversary of the Philadelphia Eleven ordinations, includes a church review, engaged history review, two film reviews, and 18 book reviews complementing 6 peer-reviewed studies and 2 accounts from women who helped break the Episcopal Church’s “stained glass ceiling.”

Church Review
Church review editor J. Barrington Bates provides a detailed profile of the iconic Church of the Advocate, site of the “irregular” ordination of 11 women in 1974. Readers learn about the North Philadelphia parish’s history as well as its current struggles to maintain its Christian witness. Church of the Advocate is part of the Philadelphia-based Episcopal Diocese of Pennsylvania.

Film Reviews
The Philadelphia Eleven, a documentary by Margo Guernsey and Nikki Bramley released in 2023 is reviewed by two viewers from opposite US coasts: Susan Russell from the Episcopal Diocese of Los Angeles and Gina L. Gore from St. James Episcopal Church, Danbury, in the Episcopal Diocese of Connecticut.

Engaged History
Engaged history features collaborative projects undertaken by Anglican and Episcopal institutions that confront underrecognized historical narratives.

In this issue, readers first learn about ways Florence Li Tim-Oi ministered in East Asia as the first woman ordained in the Anglican Communion. Then, discover ways her legacy continues as part of the Li Tim-Oi Center for Chinese Ministry founded in 2014. The center provides lay leadership training courses taught in Chinese and designed for Chinese ministry within the United States.

The profile is written by Thomas Ni, executive director of the Li Tim-Oi Center and associate for Chinese Ministry at the Church of Our Savior in San Gabriel, part of the Episcopal Diocese of Los Angeles.

Book Reviews
As always, readers enjoy a treasure trove of book reviews related to church history and Anglican scholarship. The June issue includes 18 book reviews, among them are:

• A History of Women in Christianity to 1600 by Hannah Matis | Reviewed by Valerie Abrahamsen of Brattleboro, Vermont
  

• The Sayings and Stories of the Desert Fathers and Mothers: Volume 1: A–H and The Sayings and Stories of the Desert Fathers and Mothers: Volume 2: TH-Ō from the Cistercian Studies Series as translated and introduced by Tim Vivian | Reviewed by David Brakke of The Ohio State University
  

• The Oxford Handbook of Mission Studies edited by Kirsteen Kim, Knud Jørgensen, and Alison Fithcett-Climenhaga | Reviewed by David P. Adams of the University of Galway

• Global Faith, Worldly Power: Evangelical Internationalism and U.S. Empire edited by John Corrigan, Melani McAlister, and Axel R.Schäfer | Reviewed by Samuel J. Richards of the International School of Kenya

• Liberty’s Chain: Slavery, Abolition, and the Jay Family of New York by David N. Gellman | Reviewed by Suzanne Geissler of William Paterson University

• Queens of a Fallen World: The Lost Women of Augustine’s Confessions by Kate Cooper | Reviewed by Walter Knowles of the University of the South

• She’s Weeping: An Intellectual History of Racialized Slavery and Emotions in the Atlantic World by Dannelle Gutarra Cordero | Reviewed by  Carla E. Roland Guzmán of the General Theological Seminary

• The Theology of Mercy Amba Oduyoye: Ecumenism, Feminism, and Communal Practice by Oluwatomisin Olayinka Oredein | Reviewed by Kefas Lamak of the University of Iowa

Anglican and Episcopal History is published quarterly in March, June, September, and December. Full text articles are available through JSTOR.org and for members of the Historical Society of the Episcopal Church at hsec.us/AEH.

Carter Heyward leads the latest issue of Anglican and Episcopal History (AEH) with a wide-ranging 9-part reflection on her 50 years as an ordained priest. As one of the first women ordained in the Episcopal Church–a group known as the Philadelphia Eleven–Heyward’s essay is a fitting opener for the June 2024 issue of AEH commemorating the 50th anniversary of women’s ordinations.

In her essay, Heyward recalls the spirit of God’s holy wisdom in 1974, writing that “Sophia was relentless” before calling for radical mutuality and dismantling oppression in line with Jewish theologian Martin Buber (1878-1965) and renowned poet Audre Lorde (1934-1992). Heyward, a retired professor of theology at Episcopal Divinity School, offers a clarion call for greater visibility of progressive Christianity and is especially critical of what she terms the “7 Deadly Sins of White Christian Nationalism.”

Turning to the metaphor of the “stained glass ceiling,” Paula D. Nesbitt then evaluates historic challenges for women clergy in her study titled “Feminization of the Priesthood at Fifty–and the Journey Ahead.” 

Nesbitt contends that “the Philadelphia ordinations and feminization processes may have saved the Episcopal Church from more significant membership declines.” Nesbitt is a visiting professor at the Graduate Theological Union in Berkeley, Calif.

Other studies related to the role of ordained women include:

“Graymoor Revisited” by Valerie Bailey in which readers learn about the April 1970 Graymoor Conference as an understudied “anchor event” for women’s ordination in the Episcopal Church. Bailey, a chaplain at Williams College and priest in the diocese of Western Mass., contextualizes Graymoor as an event at the end of two significant 20th century movements: the Liturgical Movement and the Deaconess Movement.

“The Phyllis Edwards Event: A Momentary Event, or an Event of Moment?” draws on archival parish, diocesan, and House of Bishop records to unearth the debate regarding Bishop James Pike’s recognition of deaconess Phyllis Edwards (1917-2009) as an ordained deacon on September 13, 1965. The debate revolved around whether deaconesses were lay or ordained servants of the church. The study’s author, John Rawlinson, is a retired priest in the Diocese of California and volunteer archivist at Church Divinity School of the Pacific.

Tukibako Charles Mwakasege offers an international Anglican Communion perspective from East Africa in “Gender Equality in the Postcolonial Diocese of Central Tanganyika.” Her investigation considers three questions in a diocese that first ordained women in 2001. These are: (1) What is the contribution of the Anglican Church toward gender equality in the Diocese of Central Tanganyika? (2) How does the post-colonial diocese implement gender equality in leadership? & (3) How does gender equality impact people of the diocese? 

Mwakasege is an assistant lecturer of history at the University of Dodoma in Tanzania.

Heather Huyck, a public historian who participated in the 1974 Philadelphia ordinations, then turns attention to “the Washington Four,” a reference to the “irregular” ordination of 4 women that occurred in September 1975 at the Episcopal Church of St. Stephen and the Incarnation in the Diocese of Washington, DC.

Huyck writes that “The ordinations of the Washington Four in 1975 were crucial in the long and complex history of women’s ordination in the Episcopal Church.” She points to ways their ordinations demonstrated that women’s ordination was likely to remain no matter what canonical changes occurred during the General Convention of the Episcopal Church in 1976. Her study is titled, “‘No Longer Unique’: The Significance of the Washington 1975 Ordinations.”

The remaining articles include a published oral history and reflective historiographic analysis.

AEH editor-in-chief Sheryl A. Kujawa-Holbrook interviews Fran Toy (b. 1934) regarding her experiences and reflections since becoming the first Asian American woman in the Episcopal priesthood in 1985.

Then Carla Roland Guzmán concludes the collection of studies with a historiographic examination of the journal itself. Guzmán’s “Women on the Pages of Anglican and Episcopal History: A Growing Cast” offers a detailed examination of women’s representation in AEH since 1932. 

Guzmán notes strengths of women’s representation and praises the noteworthy contributions of historians such as Fredrica Harris Thompsett, Joan R. Gundersen, Joanna B. Gillespie, Mary Sudman Donovan, Sylvia Sweeney, and current AEH editor Sheryl A. Kujawa-Holbrook. She also illuminates potential areas for further research. Guzmán is assistant professor of church history at The General Theological Seminary in New York City.

This special issue of AEH commemorating the 50th anniversary of the Philadelphia Eleven Ordinations is produced by the Historical Society of the Episcopal Church (HSEC). To learn more, visit the HSEC website [https://hsec.us/]. HSEC will also be represented at the 81st General Convention of the Episcopal Church in Louisville, Ky. this June.

Print or digital copies are available for $10 (which includes shipping) by contacting the Director of Operations at mpayne@hsec.us.

The March 2024 issue of Anglican and Episcopal History is now available. In addition to 6 peer-reviewed essays, readers enjoy a variety of church reviews, exhibit reviews, and 24 book reviews.

Church Reviews:

Three church reviews provide a glimpse of Holy Week Triduum customs in the Episcopal Diocese of Chicago. These include Maundy Thursday at the Church of the Ascension in Chicago’s Gold Coast neighborhood, Good Friday at Church of the Atonement in Chicago’s Edgewater neighborhood, and the Great Vigil of Easter at the diocesan cathedral of St. James.

Engaged History:

Engaged history features collaborative projects undertaken by Anglican and Episcopal institutions that confront buried historical narratives.

This issue features efforts in the Episcopal Diocese of West Missouri to address the painful legacy of White supremacy in a state where 60 people were lynched between 1877 and 1950. Readers learn about the horrific Easter 1906 lynching of Fred Coker, Horace Duncan, and Will Allen in the presence of 3,000 people in Springfield, Missouri.

The article is written by John Spicer of St. Andrew’s Episcopal Church in Kansas City, Missouri.

Exhibit Review:

Frances Perkins Center and Homestead in Newcastle, Maine | Reviewed by Brett Donham

Book Reviews:

As always, readers enjoy a treasure trove of book reviews related to church history and Anglican scholarship. The March issue includes 24 book reviews, among them are:

• Christian Homeland: Episcopalians and the Middle East, 1820-1958 by Gardiner H. Shattuck Jr. | Reviewed by Lawrence G. Duggan of the University of Delaware
• When Churches in Communion Disagree edited by Robert Heaney, Christopher Wells, and Pierre Whalon | Reviewed by J. Douglas Ousley
• The Eucharist in Four Dimensions: The Meanings of Communion in Contemporary Culture by Jessica Martin | Reviewed by Christopher L. Webber
• Archbishop William Temple: A Study in Servant Leadership by Stephen Spencer | Reviewed by John D. Alexander
• Borderlands of Theological Education edited by Joshua B. Davis and Deirdre Good | Reviewed by R. William Franklin of the Diocese of Long Island and Union Theological Seminary
• Una Historia de la Iglesia Episcopal (edición en Espanol) by Robert W. Pritchard, translated by Adrián Cárdenas Torres | Reviewed by John L. Kater of the Church Divinity School of the Pacific and Ming Hua Theological College in Hong Kong, China
• Clarendon Reconsidered: Law, Loyalty, Literature, 1640-1674 edited by Philip Major | Victor Starer of Louisiana State University
• The Medieval Mind of C.S. Lewis: How Great Books Shaped a Great Mind by Jason M. Baxter | Reviewed by Jack D. Kilcrease of Christ School of Theology in South Dakota

Anglican and Episcopal History is published quarterly in March, June, September, and December. Full text articles are available through JSTOR.org and for members of the Historical Society of the Episcopal Church at https://hsec.us/AEH.

The Historical Society of the Episcopal Church (HSEC) advances scholarship related to the Episcopal Church and Anglican Communion. The latest issues of HSEC’s peer-reviewed journal Anglican and Episcopal History (AEH) is now in print featuring 6 studies and numerous reviews, including 24 book reviews.

The 6 featured studies are:

• “The Episcopal Church’s Freedman’s Commission and the Founding of St. Augustine’s School” in Raleigh, North Carolina, in which diocesan historiographer N. Brooks Graebner, uncovers ways St. Augustine’s School opened in 1867 and became “…a notable exception” for “intersectional cooperation” across geographic regions in the antebellum United States.
• Yvan Francois and Mark Harris break new ground regarding the ministry of Episcopal bishop Charles Alfred Voegeli who was escorted to Port au Prince airport at gunpoint in 1964 on orders from François Duvalier, then-President of Haiti. “The Expulsion of the Last American Bishop of Haiti” illustrates lived experiences of conflicting loyalties between Caesar and God by introducing the Francois Folio – 32 never before published primary sources spanning 1944-1974.
• John C. Hardy, a Church of England priest, then challenges assumptions about ineffective Anglican scholar-pastors in “How ‘Effectual’ was the Anglican Scholar-Parson of the 1920s as a Parson? Alfred Guillaume and G.H. Box; A comparative Assessment.”
• “The Emergence of the Modernist Controversy in the Diocese of New York” evaluates ways various church leaders navigated heresy trials, emerging biblical debates, and diversity of theological belief in 1920s New York. Its author is Warren C. Platt, an Episcopal priest and retired reference librarian in the Research Libraries of the New York Public Library.
• “The Establishment Experience: Church-State Entanglement and the Lessons of the First Anglo-Catholic Movement”by Dn. John F. Wirenius from the Diocese of New York considers challenges the Church of England encounters as an official state church. His draws parallels between secular court interference by the Queen’s Bench and Privy Council in nineteenth-century England to similar secular court intervention as fallout since the election of Gene Robinson as Bishop of New Hampshire in 2003.
• The final study is “Waging the Spanish Civil War on British Ecclesiastical Turf: Anglican-dominated Delegations to Republican Spain” by Frederick Halea research fellow at North-West University in South Africa and teacher at Fjellhaug International University College in Norway. Halea’s essay seeks to fill a gap in British scholarship that leaves religion as one of the least studied aspects of the British response to Francisco Franco.

These studies along with church reviews, book reviews, reflections on engaged history are available in the March 2024 issue of Anglican and Episcopal History at hsec.us/aeh.

An online series, Archives Basics for Congregations, was offered via Zoom during Epiphany 2024. It focused on establishing and operating a church archive for non-professionals who might, or do already, work in a church archives. It is a resource for reference and continuing education.

The five, one-hour sessions cover purpose, policies and practices, ownership, access and security, practical tips, organizing records, inventorying, processing, digital, personal papers, operations and administration. Also available for download are session outlines, slide decks, and documents referenced.

There is no charge to view and the series is free and available to the public. All five sessions were recorded and are now available for viewing, hsec.us/archivesbasics. Please share it with others.

The Historical Society of the Episcopal Church invites requests for grants to be awarded July 2024. Funding is provided for pursuing the Historical Society’s objectives, especially promotion of the preservation of Episcopal Church and the worldwide Anglican Communion. Requests must be submitted no later than May 1st to be considered for 2024 awards.

Requests may be from individuals, academic entities or ecclesiastical groups. They may seek financial support for research, publication, and conferences relating to Episcopal and Anglican church history. A typical request may include funding for travel (for example, to an archives or other relevant location), research materials, or seed money or support as part of a larger project. Examples of past awards include dissertation research, publication of books and articles, support of documentary films, multi-media and digital historical presentations, and support for a local history conference. Awards generally are $500-$2,500, depending on the number of requests approved and funding available.

For details to make the request, visit hsec.us/grants.

Please note that requests for the triennial Robert W. Prichard Prize will be next received in 2025. The Prichard Prize honors the best dissertation which considers the history of the Episcopal Church or Anglican Communion. Additional details about the prize are also found at hsec.us/grants.

The American Historical Association (AHA) is the oldest professional association of historians in the United States and the largest such organization in the world with over 11,000 members. Its annual meeting draws more than 5,000 historians from around the United States to discuss the latest research and discuss how to be better historians and teachers. Sheryl Kujawa Holbrook, editor-in-chief of HSEC's quarterly, peer-reviewed journal Anglican and Episcopal History, attended the 2024 AHA Meeting in San Francisco in January. AEH is a member of the Conference of Historical Journals which displays samples of its members journals on in the AHA Exhibit Hall. Kujawa Holbrook shared this photo of 2 recent AEH issues displayed, along with a copy of In Honor of the 50th Anniversary of the Ordination of Women to the Priesthood in the Episcopal Church which is a curated reprint of articles from AEH.

The Historical Society of the Episcopal Church was an exhibitor at the 2023 AHA Annual Meeting and connected with hundreds of attendees with an interest in the history of the Episcopal Church. HSEC has applied to become an AHA Affiliated Society which will allow sponsorship of HSEC sessions and activities at the AHA Annual Meeting.