Lately I’ve been thinking about some of the contrasts that chase us through life at Emmanuel. They start on Sunday when I walk over the small round disk embossed BOSTON GROUNDWATER TRUST, which is set into the sidewalk in front of the church. It’s one of 800 wells monitoring the groundwater that still covers the 200,000 Maine spruce-tree trunks that were steam-pile driven-in 160 years ago to keep our feet out of the soup below. Sure, I know that part of the motivation for filling the Back Bay was to keep prosperous white Protestants from decamping to the suburbs, and my Irish great-grandfather south of the tracks. But still, there’s no way to get into Emmanuel without at least an unthinking pilgrimage over that magical, invisible, upside-down forest.
Tag Archives: windows
A Remembrance & a Legacy
In Commemoration of the Centennial of the Armistice of World War I
Twenty-fifth Sunday after Pentecost, November 11, 2018; Rabbi Howard A. Berman
Ruth 3:1-5; 4:13-17
Hebrews 9:24-28
Mark 12:38-44
Hebrews 9:24-28
Mark 12:38-44
One of the major themes of my teaching to our people at Central Reform Temple, and to all of you here at Emmanuel Church, is the importance of history as a source of spiritual truth and guidance. History, its chronicle and commemoration, and its enduring meaning and message, is a fundamental dimension of both Judaism and Christianity. The Hebrew Biblical foundation that both of our faiths share, teaches that God works through human history. The primary focus of our Scriptures is historical narrative. The events, progress, and personalities that shape history–whether global, national, communal, and even our own personal experiences–are clear revelations of God’s presence and will in the world and in our lives. We believe that the good and noble people and events in human experience have been instruments of God’s blessing, love and mercy. And yet, we also know that the evils of history, the sufferings and injustice we have inflicted upon each other, have also been signs of our failure to heed God’s will – not of Divine responsibility for suffering, but rather our human culpability for the tragedies of our past. We have been given both a clear set of moral and ethical imperatives in Torah and Gospel, as well as the innate free will to make our choices, collectively and individually, to either follow God’s law of love and justice and peace by choosing good and life or by choosing evil and death, and bringing upon ourselves, our world, and our children, the consequences of pain and suffering that have, sadly, largely marked the chronicle of human experience.
2000
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
1920
The stained-glass triptych created by Henry Wynd Young (1874–1923) was installed in the narthex (lobby) as a memorial to Emmanuel’s youth who sacrificed their lives in the Great War. Edward Hale Perry was one of them.
1873
Several famous botanists were connected with our church.
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Rhododendron “Edward S. Rand”. Photo credit: Tijs Huisman
When Benjamin Tyler Reed retired as senior warden, Edward Sprague Rand served again as warden until 1875. His son E.S. Rand, Jr. (actually III) wrote many botanical works. An orchid and a rhododendron are named for him (or perhaps his father).
- Henry Winthrop Sargent (1810-1882) became junior warden. In 1859 and 1875, he published supplements to Downing’s reference work, A Treatise on the Theory and Practice of Landscape Gardening (1841).
- Dec. 2. Winthrop Henry Sargent (1840-1916, son of H.W. & Caroline Olmsted S.) married Aimee Rotch, daughter of Emmanuel charter members Benjamin S. and Annie Bigelow Rotch. They lived at 207 Commonwealth Avenue. Winthrop served for 30 years as warden of St. Luke’s Chapel, Fishkill-on-Hudson, NY, where the Sargents summered. See also:
- Rotch Reredos
- Henry Winthrop Sargent and His Family
- Register of the Mass. Society of Colonial Dames of America: 1893-1905, (p. 83, #144) lists some of Aimee’s ancestors including Emmanuelites Amos & Nathaniel Lawrence.
- The Rev. Dr. A.H. Vinton officiated at the wedding of Mary Allen Robeson (1853-1918), daughter of charter members Andrew (1817-1874) and Mary Allen Robeson (1819-1903), and Charles Sprague Sargent (cousin of H.W. S.), who founded the Arnold Arboretum and wrote many botanical works. Andrew and his wife Mary Allen Robeson lived at Holm Lea across from Fairsted in Brookline. They were memorialized by their daughter Alice Robeson (Mrs. Stephen Van Rensselaer) Thayer in our windows depicting Simeon and Anna. See also:
- Register of the Mass. Society of Colonial Dames of America: 1893-1905, (p. 48, #41) lists Mary’s ancestors who served the Commonwealth.
- Register of the Mass. Society of Colonial Dames of America: 1893-1905, (p. 57, #66) lists even more of Alice’s ancestors.
Simeon (Andrew Robeson, 1817-1874) & Anna (Mary Allen Robeson, 1819-1903) by Harry Eldredge Goodhue
1869
- 27 December. Caroline Maria (née Welch) Crowninshield at the age of 45 married at Emmanuel Howard Payson Arnold, a 39-year-old attorney from Cambridge MA. They came to reside nearby at 156 Beacon Street. See also her memorial window.
- Dr. Huntington became the first bishop of Central New York.
- The Rev. Dr. Alexander Hamilton Vinton became our second rector.
For biographical information on Dr. Vinton please see the chapter on him in Emmanuel Church, 1860-1960: The First Hundred Years.
See also Timeline 1894.