200th Anniversary Special Feature—It’s a VERY special St. Stephen’s feast day!

200 years ago, the new St. Stephen’s community in Philadelphia thought its physical church would be ready by its patron saint’s feast day. Apparently not so—the church was consecrated the following February. Meanwhile, we imagine the group energetically putting its mission into practice in other ways.  

Today, so many years later, we take special pleasure in revisiting our patron saint’s importance and example.

To that end, we share a new honor: Our earlier Reflection on St. Stephen is included in a new publication by a sister church in the American West, the Grace and St. Stephen’s Episcopal Church (GSS) of Colorado Springs, Colorado. You can read the issue here.  

The volume is GSS’s Seasonal Journal for Advent, Christmas, and Epiphany 2022-23, produced by their editor, Professor Emerita of English Joan Klingel Ray. The slightly edited selections vary in type—reflections, meditations and sermon—written, in this case, by clerical and lay persons attached to Episcopal churches nationwide. Each contribution in this issue addresses individual remembrances on the liturgical calendar through Epiphany, and aims, in being read and contemplated, to enhance readers’ spiritual and intellectual lives. Ours represents St. Stephen on his feast day, which is why we post the publication today.  

By appearing in an issue made available digitally to the participating authors and churches, these contributions become accessible to a broader kindred community. We thank the GSS and Professor Ray for including us during the church’s especially significant landmark, its 200th anniversary on February 27, 2023. 

Season’s greetings to all!

Suzanne Glover Lindsay, St. Stephen’s historian and curator