An 1848 print by Tompkins Harrison Matteson depicts the Rev. Jacob Duché offering the first prayer on Sept. 7, 1774, during an early First Continental Congress in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Photo: New York Public Library Digital Collection
[Episcopal News Service] Two Episcopal priests who serve historic Philadelphia churches recently participated in a panel discussion marking the 250th anniversary of the opening of the First Continental Congress in that Pennsylvania city in 1774.
They joined other local faith leaders – Christian, Jewish and Muslim – in a discussion entitled “Faith and Democracy and the Legacy of the First Prayer in Congress,” where they talked about the role of prayer and religion in government and American civic culture.
The Rev. Samantha Vincent-Alexander is rector of Christ Church, and the Rev. Sarah Hedgis-Kligerman is associate rector of St. Peter’s. Christ Church was founded in 1695, and in 1761 it created St. Peter’s as a church for parishioners in that part of the city; the two churches served as one unified parish with shared clergy. One of the churches’ pre-Revolution rectors, the Rev. Jacob Duché, played an important role in that first Congress.
The Congress gathered in Philadelphia’s Carpenter Hall on Sept. 5, 1774, and included representatives from 12 of the 13 colonies (Georgia was absent). They met in response to the British Parliament’s adoption of the Coercive Acts of 1774 – known in the colonies as the Intolerable Acts – that sought to stop a proposed boycott of British goods in response to England’s blockade of the port of Boston and its declaration of martial law in Massachusetts.
Delegates were divided on whether their meetings should open with a prayer, given that they came from a variety of Christian churches. Among the fiercest opponents were New York’s John Jay and South Carolina’s John Rutledge, both Anglicans, who feared such a move would only divide the delegates.
Bostonian Samuel Adams, a staunch Congregationalist, helped decide the issue when he declared, “I am no bigot. I can hear a prayer from a man of piety and virtue, who is at the same time a friend of his country.” He then suggested Duché deliver the first opening prayer, which took place on Sept. 7. (The Congress continued to meet until Oct. 26.)
Among the faith leaders taking part at a Sept. 5, 2024, event marking the 250th anniversary of the opening of the First Continental Congress were (second from left, seated) the Rev. Rev. Samantha Vincent-Alexander, rector of Christ Church; and (second from right, seated) the Rev. Sarah Hedgis-Kligerman, associate rector of St. Peter’s. Both are colonial-era churches in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Photo: David Krueger
Vincent-Alexander and Hedgis-Kligerman told Episcopal News Service that while the panel discussed how and if Duché’s prayer was relevant today, they spent most of their time exploring how clergy navigate the question of whether and how to get involved in talking about political issues.
Hedgis-Kligerman said that the decision to ask Duché to pray was as much political as pious, given that Massachusetts needed the support of delegates from other states who weren’t Congregationalists. That fact prompted discussion among the panel of how clergy might respond when called to appear as part of political events or even ceremonies. She said Vincent-Alexander both said their feelings about this are shaped, in part, by another former rector, the Rev. William White, who served the parish during the time before and after the Revolutionary War and later became the second bishop of The Episcopal Church and its first presiding bishop.
“Christ Church very much identifies as a church with a revolutionary spirit,” Vincent-Alexander noted. “We specifically talk about how we struck the names and prayers for the royal family from the Book of Common Prayer on July 4, 1776.” But as the one responsible for that, White also was protecting the church from those who would have seen anything else as being against American independence, she said. “He was looking out for the safety and the welfare of our church.”
“White didn’t take a stance on independence until after the Declaration of Independence was written,” Hedgis-Kligerman said, which points to his attempt to walk a middle way, the via media for which Anglicanism is known, and to keep the congregation together. “I’m trying, as a clergy person, to find ways to speak to both sides, or different sides, of an issue,” she said, which sometimes prompts her to question whether she isn’t being authentic to a prophetic calling. “But I see Bishop White as an example, that he was able to keep the church together, which was incredibly important at that time.”
Vincent-Alexander and Hedgis-Kligerman were to have shared a reading of Duché’s prayer on Sept. 7, but prior commitments kept them from doing that (the Rev. Palmer Hartl of Christ Church did the reading).
As she thought about doing that reading, Hedgis-Kligerman said she wondered whether having a woman undertake that would make “Duché roll over in his grave” in St. Peter’s Churchyard, which she can see from her office window. She and Vincent-Alexander, two women, both represent historical parishes because they serve as their clergy. “But in the originalist sense, do we?” Hedgis-Kligerman asked. As the second woman to serve as a priest at St. Peter’s, she added, “I like that tension very much.”
When she first walked into her office at Christ Church, Vincent-Alexander – the parish’s first woman rector – said a large, rather imposing painting of White hung on a wall. “That space had always been a space for men, and seeing [the painting], I saw how I didn’t fit, and also how I could fit.” She added, “I think places like Christ Church and St Peter’s have tried very hard to have our own little revolutions.”
Hedgis-Kligerman said she and other panelists also discussed what guidance from each panelist’s faith tradition helps them make sense of their political involvement. “I said that Duché was very much in the room where it happened, with the people who had the power. Some of my challenge is finding what I need to unlearn from my tradition to have more faithful involvement,” she said, especially the privilege that comes from being white.
One way to do that, she said, is to tell the story of another famous Philadelphia Episcopalian of the pre-Revolution era, Absalom Jones. Born an enslaved Black man, he attended St. Peter’s with the man who owned him, and he married his wife there in 1770. Jones went on to found the African Episcopal Church of St. Thomas in Philadelphia, and in 1802 he was ordained the first Black priest in The Episcopal Church by White.
“Churches, and maybe all places, are so good about talking about everything we are proud of in our history,” Vincent-Alexander said. “And we so rarely talk about where we didn’t follow the gospel message.”
Being a priest at a church like Christ Church or St. Peter’s, with such long histories, provides a unique challenge and opportunity, Hedgis-Kligerman said. “It involves a fair amount of being honest and telling the truth, and seeing where that truth might lead us closer to God’s vision for how we can live together.”
— Melodie Woerman is an Episcopal News Service freelance reporter based in Kansas.