Historical Writings

Death of Pope St. Martin I. He was imprisoned and then banished by Emperor Constans II who rejected the doctrine of Christ's two wills.

The Third Council of Constantinople (Sixth Ecumenical Council) adjourns, having condemned Monothelites as heretics for believing Christ's human will was lost in the divine.

During an extended period of prayer and fasting, St. Francis of Assisi, 42, received the stigmata (crucifixion scars of Christ) on Mount Alvernia, in Italy. Francis, the founder of the Franciscans in 1209, has been called by some the greatest of all the Christian saints.

Death of Tomás de Torquemeda, head of the Spanish Inquisition. He had burned at least two thousand victims (some say ten thousand) and tortured thousands more.

Death at Louvain of Michael Baius, a Catholic theologian whose works were twice censured by popes. His teachings influenced Cornelius Jansen, a founder of the Jansenist movement.

The "Mayflower" set sail from Plymouth, England, bound for the New World. On board were 48 crew members and 101 colonists (including 35 Separatists from Leiden, Holland, known afterward as the Pilgrims). During the three-month voyage, two passengers died and two babies were born.

Death from consumption of Anne Bradstreet, the first poet of New England's Puritans.

Miguel Hidalgo y Costilla, a Mexican Catholic priest, rings a church bell to announce revolution against the Spanish. Indians and mestizos will capture many cities, but authorities will capture Hidalgo and shoot him the following year.

Scottish pastor Robert Murray McCheyne wrote in a letter: 'Grace fills us with very different feelings from the possession of anything else. If you have tasted the grace of the Gospel, the irresistible longing of your hearts will be, "Oh, that all the world might taste its regenerating waters."'

Robert College (now Bogaziçi University) opens in Constantinople with Cyrus Hamlin as its first President. Hamlin - educator, inventor, architect, and missionary - had gone to Turkey eighteen years earlier where he worked with the Armenian minority and established a seminary for pastors and teachers.

Birth of J.B. Phillips, Anglican clergyman. Ordained in 1930, he wrote "Your God is Too Small" (1951), but is better remembered for his biblical paraphrase, "The New Testament in Modern English," first published in 1958.

Death of Maria Buelah Woodworth-Etter, who for many years had been a tent evangelist, revivalist, and faith healer in the United States, widely regarded as a precursor of Pentecostal evangelists.

Death in Minnesota of John Augustine Ryan, a Roman Catholic priest, educator, and proponent of economic theories that he hoped would lead to distributive justice. His doctoral dissertation was titled A Living Wage.

In Minneapolis, the 65th Triennial General Convention of the Episcopal Church officially approved ordination of women to the priesthood.

Death of Tulinawo Luhomano Msinjili. He had been the first provincial chairman of the Moravian Church in Southwest Tanzania, known for his hard work and patience.