USA > Connecticut > The story of the Diocese of Connecticut : a new branch of the vine (Espiscopal Church) > Part 33
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THE BROTHERHOOD OF ST. ANDREW
The Brotherhood has existed in Connecticut since the 1880's, and recently has been revived by the interest in better laymen's service. Founded to encourage deeper spiritual life among men and boys, it declined after many years of earnest activity but re- vived about 1915 with the encouragement of Bishop Brewster. An- other declension came during the depressed 1930's and World War
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II. A new thrill of life is now pulsing through the Brotherhood, stimulated by the Department of Youth and Laymen's Work. In the early 1950's there were four active senior chapters and ten parishes were seriously considering new ones. The Brotherhood holds an annual spring assembly with a dinner, a speaker, and Evening Prayer read by the diocesan chaplain.
THE CHURCH CLUB OF THE DIOCESE OF CONNECTICUT
The club, organized by laymen in 1892, has served quietly but effectively in association with lay readers and the Brotherhood. Although the membership always has been small, it has exerted a great influence through meetings and its participation in the con- ventions of the National Federation of Church Clubs. Since 1913 the Club has sponsored the annual Diocesan Convention dinner, the only occasion that brings it to the attention of many Churchmen.
The Club supported the first great public men's activity in the Diocese - the Laymen's Missionary Movement. It was or- ganized at Christ Church, Hartford, in November, 1909, with pro- motion committees for the city and suburban parishes. In January, 1910 the Club sponsored a mass-meeting of seven hundred laymen from central Connecticut, to hear an address on "The American Layman's Opportunity" and reports on missionary prospects in Cuba and newly awakened China. The movement continued for months, and set the pattern for later laymen's missions and more generous missionary giving.
The Club has helped the clergy in evangelism and con- tributed generously to ministry for servicemen in wartime, and the movement to acquire a Diocesan House received its earnest sup- port. Bishop Acheson frequently received its help in emergencies, and seconded its appeal to the Convention for more members. His tribute is as timely today as it was then: "The fellowship of the Club is something worth while. A man meets on friendly ground the active Churchmen of the Diocese and hears speeches and ad- dresses of value from time to time."" The Club's sociability is not an end in itself, but expresses spiritual loyalty and practical service.
THE KNIGHTS OF WASHINGTON
The Knights began in the awareness of Church Club mem- bers and other laymen that the Diocese lacked a society for
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younger men. Most lay readers and Clubmen were middle-aged or elderly, and the Brotherhood of St. Andrew appealed only to the more devout. After the age for boys' organizations, young men tended to drift from church moorings.
That problem disturbed the conscience of Floyd S. Kenyon, the socially-minded rector of Christ Church, West Haven. In Octo- ber, 1909 he called a meeting of seven young men, who founded the Order of the Knights of Washington, to interest young men in Church work. Named in honor of the Churchman, George Wash- ington, the Order encouraged loyalty to Church and country, re- called the part of Episcopalians in founding the nation, and supplemented the boys' groups.
The Knights became a national institution organized in mili- tary fashion, with the attraction of a fraternity ritual. The first initiation occurred in February, 1910, and within a year four Con- necticut companies were working hard to attract young men. Kenyon headed the diocesan organization, which held an annual meeting and sponsored local ceremonies on Washington's birthday, published a quarterly newspaper, performed colorful degree cere- monies, and gave dances and athletic field days.
All who had deplored the Church's neglect of young men were delighted, and in 1911 the Diocesan Commission on Work among Young Men and Boys gave the Order a special commen- dation. Bishop Brewster praised the Knights in his Convention ad- dress in 1915, and for many years they fulfilled his hope of benefits throughout and beyond the Diocese.
COORDINATION OF LAYMEN'S WORK
This movement waited for several decades. The inspiration came from the General Convention, which perceived the necessity of an organization similar to the Woman's Auxiliary, and in 1931 established the Laymen's League to help willing men to work for the promotion of their faith. Its success in the Diocese suggested weekend conferences to further friendships and make plans. The idea spread with Bishop Budlong's enthusiastic support, and mean- while men responded heartily to the Presiding Bishop's request for an annual Advent Corporate Communion. The thank offering was reserved as a special fund for a Laymen's Conference.
World War II postponed the conference, but in June, 1946
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the first Laymen's Retreat and Conference convened at Trinity College. Bishop Gray's plea for representation of every parish and mission brought an amazing response, which inspired a larger meeting in the autumn of 1947. Potential young leaders received training to succeed the veterans, and the benefits soon appeared in a longing to understand and realize religion, and to work harder for missions and diocesan church extension. Attendance at the Advent Communion increased, together with the offerings for the Camps and Conference program for boys and girls.
Another outgrowth of the laymen's awakening is the plan- ning conference of parish "Key Men," organized in 1953. Its an- nual picnics in June at Camp Washington, sponsored by the Lay- men's Division, adopt the program for the coming year. Activities at first were coordinated by the Laymen's Advisory Committee, which in 1953 was succeeded by the Laymen's Division of the De- partment of Youth and Laymen's Work, under the skilful man- agement of the Secretary, Morton O. Nace. The Division issues a monthly bulletin and a work program, and the Secretary travels through the Diocese to assist in organizing men's groups for spirit- ual activities. The Division really is a collaboration of the Church Club, the Brotherhood of St. Andrew, the lay readers, and the Laymen's Conference.
BOYS' ORGANIZATIONS
Boys' groups became significant with the spread of boy choirs after 1880. In cities their growth paralleled the increasing concern for boys' welfare in the Scout and Social Gospel move- ments of the early 1900's. Informal, spontaneous clubs had ap- peared in urban parishes after the Civil War, and one of the earli- est was in Christ Church, New Haven. Soon after he became rec- tor in 1886, the Rev. Edward Brinley Morgan was visited by a group who wanted to have a club in a small house belonging to the parish. With money raised by the boys, the women made the place into a homelike clubhouse, which delighted the boys and their friends and eventually became the parish house.
Other parishes profited by this example, which encouraged the establishment of junior chapters of the Brotherhood of St. An- drew, and later of the Knights of King Arthur. But deep piety and fraternal rituals did not appeal to all, and the Social Gospel
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movement called attention to the hopeless inadequacy of the Church's ministry to boys. Thoughtful laymen were startled by the constant defection of teen-age boys and young men from the Church. It was estimated that seventy-five per cent of those con- firmed were soon lost. This unpleasant fact hit the Diocese in Bishop Brewster's address to the Convention in 1911, and aroused action by four priests - Frederic M. Burgess, J. Chauncey Linsley, James Goodwin, and Floyd S. Kenyon. Burgess prodded the Con- vention to refer the matter to seven priests appointed by the Bishop as the Commission on Work among Young Men and Boys.
In October, 1911 they formed a committee on work among college students. Four months later Doctor Goodwin presided at a large conference of workers among boys and young men, which thoroughly reviewed every aspect of the problem. The Commis- sion made the Conference an annual event and developed a broad program of work, comprising expansion of the Knights of Washing- ton, the Knights of King Arthur and the Brotherhood of St. An- drew, and the establishment of a fully equipped diocesan summer camp, which could also be a conference center and rest house.
The camp began joyfully at Crystal Lake in July, 1911, and was directed by that noble pair of spiritual brothers, "Fred" Bur- gess and Floyd Kenyon. Despite lack of equipment, it was such a rapturous experience that nobody dreamed of not continuing it next year. The days of sports and spiritual conversation began with Morning Prayer and closed with Evening Prayer. Every Sun- day morning the campers gathered on a hill overlooking the lake and opened the service with the hymn "When morning gilds the skies." They left the spot with a vision of a permanent diocesan camp, where Churchmen would knit friendships and learn to think of religion as something bigger than their parishes.
THE EVOLUTION OF CAMP WASHINGTON
As the Commission appealed for funds and searched the country towns for a site, realization sometimes seemed far away. The Diocesan Convention empowered the Bishop to appoint trus- tees and made a token appropriation of fifty dollars, hoping that philanthropy would foot the bill. But it took a long time to make complacent Episcopalians think about the needs of poor boys and youths. Doctor Goodwin bluntly said that the saloon hung out
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the welcome sign when the Church did not, and the Commission pointedly suggested a boys' club room in every parish. Interest lagged until Doctor Goodwin's death revealed his hard work for the cause, and the "draft" in World War I uncovered the physical and moral deterioration among young men.
The next chairman of the Commission was Floyd Kenyon, who fairly shamed the Church's men into action. "Are we afraid of the problem because it is so difficult? Shall we dismiss the grow- ing young man because he is so troublesome? ... The study of the drift of young men away from the Church has emphasized the force of example. Boys as a rule are led or driven to church until they reach the age of independence. When force ceases to rule their conduct they must be inspired. Older men need to realize that their indifferent example and conduct is responsible for a large part of the irreligion and later immorality of the young."6 Under his inspiration the Commission suggested father-and-son parish dinners and corporate Communions.
The World War appeared to sidetrack the movement, but really promoted it by making the Commission arouse Churchmen to befriend fellow parishioners in the armed forces. The effort fell far short of the ideal, but helped to open people's eyes to the Church's responsibility for youth, by special Communions for men just entering the services, pocket Prayer Books, parish contacts with chaplains, and letters from rectors and parishioners.
After the war the vision of a youth center no longer seemed to be the "impractical" dream of "idealistic" social-service work- ers. It had not appeared so to the wealthy Mrs. G. A. Senff, who observed the camp's good work and gave the Diocese a large site at Bantam Lake in Morris, and funds for buildings. The gift was a timely solution to the problems of securing a suitable site, and of raising food for the nation and its allies in wartime. The Com- mission erected buildings and ran the camp as a combination of food factory and vacation resort. Men and boys left in better health after a summer's work.
The news of success got around, and helped Floyd Kenyon to crack the general indifference to the untouched opportunities among men and youths. He appealed to pride in the camp's previ- ous achievement in services and conferences, and hoped to see it used by every man and boy in the Diocese. If the Church could
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get boys away from the "asphalt jungle" and into the country, nature might make God seem more real to them.
Kenyon lived to see his dream come true. Backed by Bishops Brewster and Acheson, and by the gifts of generous laymen, the camp added acres and buildings. In the 1920's it became firmly rooted in the affection of many Churchmen, who rallied under the leadership of three noble priests - Dan Russ Judd, Arthur F. Lewis, and Floyd Kenyon - and the Director, Douglas Coe. The boy campers were gathered from organizations which the Com- mission promoted, particularly servers' guilds, Sir Galahad clubs, and Church School classes organized as clubs.
Attendance soon taxed accommodations, donors dug into their pockets, and up went more cabins. Over the years the im- provised camp of 1911 has grown into a spiritual university, based upon the Commission's "Four Capital C's of Work" - clubs, camps, conferences, and corporate Communions. The Commission strove to unite all the Church's services to boys and youths, from the parish house club to the annual conferences at Yale University and Concord, Massachusetts. Through the camp the Diocese discovered the unsuspected power of the Holy Communion to draw men and boys together, and the camp revealed their fellowship in the Church to everybody there.
Thanks to the Episcopal Development Program and private gifts, in the 1950's Sunniecroft-Camp Washington became a cen- ter such as few other dioceses can claim. Completely renovated and greatly expanded by new buildings, it is administered by the General Secretary of the Department of Youth and Laymen's Work and a board of managers appointed by the Bishop with approval by the trustees and the Executive Council of the Diocese. The Young People's Fellowship raised funds to furnish the beautiful Chapel of the Holy Spirit, (given by Mrs. Howard Weir and Mrs. Henry H. Conland) which Bishop Gray dedicated in June, 1955. The center pays its way as host to innumerable conferences and campers. It stands as the realized vision of that determined band who have fought for the redemption of young people.
YOUNG PEOPLE'S FELLOWSHIP
The "Y.P.F." is a witness to the awakening of the Church to the religious needs of youth. The Church was scarcely aware of
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youths before World War I, for the established societies appealed mostly to older people. A few city parishes made gestures, as when St. John's in New Haven opened its guild rooms for weekly dances for working girls and their boy friends, under the auspices of the Daughters of the King. Young people of all creeds and nationalities mingled with Yale students and Church girls. The Rector, Stewart Means, supported the venture in the spirit of the new youth movement that began to sweep over the Church in the 1920's.
It came when from all sides rose the cry that the Church had neglected the young and was being neglected by them. The Diocese suddenly woke up and emulated other churches by start- ing a Conference for Young People, from which grew the Young People's Fellowship. Bishop Brewster turned to the movement in eager hope and his suffragan, Bishop Acheson, urged the clergy to visit the summer youth conferences and organize parochial groups.
For over thirty years the conferences have been eagerly an- ticipated events, enjoying the hospitality of private schools - Pom- fret, Taft in Watertown, or St. Margaret's, Waterbury. Courses are given by eminent Church teachers, and parishes send delegates to be trained for teaching and leadership, sometimes on scholarships provided by the Bishop or the Woman's Auxiliary. The early suc- cess depended heavily upon the Department of Religious Educa- tion, particularly the Rev. Samuel Sutcliffe of New Britain and the Director, Miss Helen Stevens. Bishop Acheson listened to young people who told him how much the conferences meant to them, and prodded the clergy to touch the pocket nerves of wealthy parishioners for investment in "living power." Bishop Budlong urged scholarships for promising boys, and hoped to integrate the conferences into the Department of Young Churchmen of the National Council.
During World War II the "Y. P. F." welcomed servicemen and young workers in defense plants. The impulse continued after the war and inspired extension of the conference program, Christ- mas youth reunions, rallies after Easter, the Diocesan Youth Week- end in autumn, and observances of Youth Sunday. The Diocesan Youth Council sponsored a quarterly newspaper that circulated all over the state, and clerical and lay delegates represented the diocese at national and provincial youth meetings.
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The youth movement in the 1940's coincided with Bishop Gray's longing for a larger diocesan conference center. His vision has been realized not only by the remodeled and enlarged Camp Washington, but also by the creation in 1952 of the Department of Youth and Laymen's Work. The General Secretary, Morton O. Nace, brought a long experience in ministry among young people and in reviving the Brotherhood of St. Andrew. The department has divisions for Youth, Camps and Conferences, College Work, and Young Adults, with chairmen and representative committees. The result has been a long overdue conviction that "God does not wait until we are 21 to speak to us." In the 1950's the diocese made its first determined effort to spread the news of youth and chil- dren's activities into every home by a well-edited "Youth Page" in the Connecticut Churchman.
THE PARISH HOUSE
The parish house often is the place where groups of all ages fashion the substance of diocesan and national accomplishment. Yet while they take it for granted, few Church people know how recent the parish house is. Until the late 1800's women's guilds met in homes, choirs rehearsed in the organ loft, and the affairs of a wealthy urban parish might be administered from an office in the business district. Rare was the church with an adjoining building erected especially for parochial activities.
Early in the nineteenth century a few large parishes re- quired buildings for special occasions and erected "chapels" that were really meeting halls. The first one in Connecticut probably was Christ Church, Hartford, which in 1835 built a detached brick chapel behind the church. It was used for meetings and weekday services until 1879, when it was succeeded by "parish rooms" at- tached to the church. The modern parish house was not opened until 1917.
Chapels, sometimes with guild rooms, appeared in the late 1800's in other city parishes. St. John's, Bridgeport, in the early 1900's acquired a regular parish house. Some parishes, like Christ Church in New Haven, unsuccessfully tried to solve the problem by converting a dwelling house. The ladies used the upper floor for sewing and the lower floor for suppers. There was no kitchen and (except in scorching weather) hot dishes carried from the sex-
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ton's house were likely to be lukewarm when they reached the dining room. That, the women said firmly, would never do. They were delighted when a rich parishioner gave a parish house, which was dedicated in 1902 by Bishop Brewster. He also was pleased but did not miss a chance to point out the abuses and perils of "parish house religion."
The parish house era began in the 1880's, coinciding with the origins of several general Church societies with local chapters. They required meeting places, for which homes were inadequate, and the result was a proliferation of parish houses, which are fre- quently mentioned in parochial histories between 1885 and World War I. Often the house required prolonged effort and heavy ex- pense, and a campaign to overcome the opposition of conservatives who dreaded "worldly" activities. The women usually started the ball rolling and frequently got what they wanted through their own sacrifices, grit, and perseverance.
Parish houses came on silver platters to a few fortunate churches. Grace Church in Hamden received one in 1902 from the nephew of the Rev. Joseph Brewster, Bishop Chauncey B. Brews- ter's father. It was a typical building of the period, with a large assembly room divided by folding doors, a cloak room and a kitchen, but no classrooms.
Parish houses of this type became hopelessly inadequate when organizations multiplied and Church School education shifted from catechizing and memorizing Bible stories to more elaborate and supposedly more effective methods. Christ Church in West Haven had that experience with its house, erected about 1890 from plans drawn by a parishioner. When the town became a suburban community and the socially-minded Floyd S. Kenyon became rec- tor, the building was soon bursting its joints, and in 1916 was suc- ceeded by a modern one. The new idea of a parish house was ex- pressed in one of the dedication addresses, "The Service of a Parish House in a Community," by the Rev. George L. Paine.
Numerous other parishes shared this experience, due to the changing ideal of the church's place in the community and the in- crease of services to special groups. In Holy Trinity Church, Mid- dletown, the impulse came largely from flourishing clubs for men and boys. In St. Andrew's, Meriden, the rector pleaded the needs of the Church School and the guilds, without which the parish
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would miss opportunities to grow. Fifty years later the building there was outmoded, mostly because of the expansion in young people's activities, and was completely reconstructed. Many parish histories reveal this emerging concept of the parish house activities as a redemptive agent penetrating the world through the work of groups. This was a part of the work of diocesan home missions, which kept pace with the efforts of the Diocese to help in evange- lizing the nation's frontiers and new states.
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CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
PIONEERING IN OTHER STATES
NEW ENGLAND
N the 1760's reports of missionaries began to deplore the depletion of their parishes by continual emigration. Winslow of Stratford lamented that his flock consisted chiefly of middle- aged and older people. The young moved "where they have more room to spread and improve their husbandry."1 Others frankly wrote that new converts barely balanced the losses, and that their parishes were threatened with stagnation. Viets of Simsbury feared that many on the frontier would drift into dissent or indifference. Peters of Hebron, more optimistic, thought that new settlements offered to the Church an unparalleled opportunity for expansion, and time proved him to be right.
After the British conquest of Canada, emigrants swarmed up the Connecticut Valley. Especially in the new western town- ships of New Hampshire, they found "the smiling prospect of fine wheat-crops,"2 and lands reserved to support the Church. Later the Church recovered the endowment by a lawsuit, in which a Connecticut priest, Daniel Barber, took a prominent part.
By the outbreak of the Revolutionary troubles, hundreds of Episcopalian families were scattered through Western Massachu- setts, southern Vermont, and western New Hampshire. After build- ing homes and breaking the soil, their first care was to gather a parish and erect a crude little church, which often attracted many surrounding Dissenters. Great Barrington, Lenox, Arlington in Ver- mont, and Claremont in New Hampshire became centers of mis- sionary enterprise. For many years they kept in constant touch with Connecticut, from which their pastors came.
The Revolutionary War, the cessation of aid from the S. P. G., the closing of many churches, and the exile or silencing of many clergymen seriously crippled missionary enterprise. For years after the war, practically all energy was consumed by efforts to revive
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the Church and to attain diocesan and national organization. The General Convention considered missions in 1795 and laid the re- sponsibility upon the struggling dioceses. It did not really awaken to the missionary challenge until 1821, with the founding of the Domestic and Foreign Missionary Society. The impulse came largely from the pleas of the new Diocese of Ohio, founded mostly by Connecticut Churchmen, and from Bishop Alexander Viets Griswold, born in Simsbury, Connecticut.
The Society's agents were welcomed by Bishop Brownell and many Connecticut parishes, and a woman in Middletown made the first recorded large gift for missions. One of the most active agents was the Rev. Nathaniel Sheldon Wheaton of Hartford, who became a missionary in Michigan. Parochial auxiliary societies sprang up, and the Board of Missions, organized in 1835, included two Connecticut men: the Rev. Doctor Harry Croswell of New Haven and Samuel H. Huntington of Hartford.
By that date regions in Northern New England, New York, and the Old Northwest had been populated largely from Connecti- cut. For many years the roads and the Erie Canal were arteries draining away multitudes of ambitious families. The flood was swelled by dissatisfaction with the governing Federalist oligarchy and the state church, and by economic distress caused by the War of 1812 and the depression of 1819. Timothy Dwight, the president of Yale, estimated that New England had provided at least sixty per cent of New York's increase of population between 1790 and 1810. It is believed that no state, in proportion to size, contributed more than Connecticut to the new states and their Episcopal churches.
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