Nov. 14. Craig Smith, our music director and founder of Emmanuel Music, died. Richard Dyer wrote an obituary for Emmanuel Music.
Piano-collector Hu Youyi purchased our Casavant organ and shipped it to the Organ Art Center on Gulangyu Island, Fujian Province, China, where it was restored by Rieger Orgelbau and installed in a concert hall (above) in 2017. See also the record for Opus 700 in the Pipe Organ Database.
Don Kreider with his award from the Mathematical Association of America.
Ball team with The Rev. Sara Irwin (front left), The Rev. Bill Blaine Wallace (back row, orange shirt) & Emmanuelites*
June 4. Boston Globe reported that The Rev. Dr. Willliam Blaine-Wallace had performed same-sex marriages despite The Rt. Rev. Thomas Shaw‘s proscription of such in the wake of a Massachusetts Supreme Court ruling in May, which had made them legal.
June 20. Boston Globe quoted Bill Blaine-Wallace, who supported the Rev. I. Carter Heyward in her retirement from out diocese saying, “I want the wider community to know that a straight priest and mainstream parish are participating in constructive disobedience.”
July. Our vestry endorsed our rector’s disobedience with a statement, “Support for Same-Sex Marriage”.
Summer. Emmanuel fielded a team* for an interfaith wiffle-ball match on the Boston Common with First Church (Unitarian Universalist). Behind them are Polish freedom fighters in a sculpture called The Partisans, which has since been moved to the intersection of Congress & D Streets.
Rabbi Howard A. Berman
Bill Blaine-Wallace invited the nascent congregation Boston Jewish Spirit to hold its services as guests at Emmanuel. Rabbi Howard A. Berman became Rabbi in Residence. The first meetings of what would later become Central Reform Temple were held in our library.
*If you know any missing members of this line-up, please advise us: archivist@EmmanuelBoston.org.
31 May. Our 12th rector, The Very Rev. Pamela L. Werntz, was ordained to the priesthood in our diocese by The Rt. Rev. Thomas M. Shaw, SSJE. Having graduated from the Episcopal Divinity School, she was sponsored for ordination by Christ Church, Cambridge, whose rector The Rev. Robert Tobin was her mentor.
Roof and other post-fire repairs began.
Dec. Under the editorship of Nelina Bachman Emmanuel News was published with its new name, Voices.
Priscilla Rawson Young in the 1990s. photo: Eric Roth
19 June. Priscilla Rawson Young died in Needham MA and was buried in the Rawson plot at Skiff Mountain Cemetery, Kent CT. Our angel bequeathed $100K to sustain our mission and $1M for our music program. The Young Fund today supports Emmanuel Music‘s series of Bach cantatas, which can be heard in our services on Youtube and on Sundays in our sanctuary during the academic year. See also 1909 1939, 1942, 1971, 1973 & 1994.
Nov. 12. A devastating fire due to faulty wiring near our sacristy was reported by women in Safe Haven. The Burnham Window, designed by the English firm of Heaton, Butler & Bayne, was broken by firefighters. Given in memory of Marian Burnham, who drowned at a young age, the window has been restored by Serpentino Studios thanks to a generous grant from the George B. Henderson Foundation.
Photo credit: Don Kreider
Stephen Babcock welcomed congregants to our sanctuary for more than twenty years.
Then following The Rev. Hugh Weaver’s suggestion, he began to serve as usher and welcome congregants on Sundays. His ministry was to last more than two decades, until the Covid pandemic put an end to it. Standing outside what we now call the Babcock Doors in all seasons, he greeted each parishioner by name and helped newcomers find their way. His smile and kindliness will be remembered by all who have been privileged to know him.