50 Fun Facts About The Episcopal Church

Which Star Wars villain, drawn by a child for a contest, is carved on Washington National Cathedral?

Darth Vader glares from high on a tower because Christopher Rader's sketch took third place in a 1980s National Geographic World competition for new grotesques.

Which Apollo-era object sits at the centre of the Space Window in Washington National Cathedral?

A Moon rock was presented for the window in 1974, on the fifth anniversary of Apollo 11; it may be the most familiar of the cathedral's two hundred or more stained glass windows.

Which Episcopal bishop preached at the 2018 wedding of Prince Harry and Meghan Markle?

Michael Curry was the first African American to lead the Episcopal Church, chosen as Presiding Bishop on the first ballot in 2015.

Which Founding Father, killed in an 1804 duel, is buried at Trinity Church on Wall Street?

Alexander Hamilton shares the churchyard with his wife Eliza, his sister-in-law Angelica Schuyler Church and the tailor-spy Hercules Mulligan.

Which president served as senior warden of an Episcopal church in Hyde Park while in office?

Franklin Roosevelt worshipped at St. James' from boyhood, and his parents and four of his children lie in its churchyard, a few miles from the family estate.

Which Boston landmark, still an Episcopal parish, showed two lanterns for Paul Revere's ride?

Old North Church is the oldest church building still standing in Boston, and its tower holds the oldest change-ringing bells on the continent, cast in 1744.

Who preached at Washington National Cathedral in 1968 on the final Sunday before he was killed?

Martin Luther King Jr. spoke from the cathedral's carved stone pulpit on 31 March 1968, and a memorial service for him was held in the same building days later.

Which future presidential nominee graduated from Episcopal High School in Virginia in 1954?

John McCain excelled at wrestling there before following his father and grandfather to the Naval Academy; the boarding school opened in 1839 as the first high school in the state.

Which poet credited with A Visit from St. Nicholas gave land for an Episcopal seminary?

Clement Clarke Moore handed over the apple orchard of his family's Chelsea estate in Manhattan for the campus, then taught Oriental and Greek literature there.

Which Supreme Court justice who argued Brown v. Board of Education has an Episcopal feast day?

Thurgood Marshall is remembered on 17 May, the date of the Brown ruling, and once walked out of a national church meeting that refused to back defiance of segregation laws.

Which clergyman, consecrated in Scotland in 1784, became the first Episcopal bishop?

Samuel Seabury could not swear the oath of allegiance to the Crown that English law demanded, so three bishops consecrated him in a house in Aberdeen instead.

The first eleven women ordained Episcopal priests, in 1974, are known by the name of which city?

Philadelphia's Church of the Advocate hosted the irregular service on 29 July 1974, two years before the church's lawmakers formally opened the priesthood to women.

Which man born into slavery in Delaware became the first African American Episcopal priest in 1802?

Absalom Jones bought his wife's freedom before his own, so that their children would be born free, and founded the first Black Episcopal congregation in 1794.

Who was consecrated in Boston in 1989 as the first woman bishop in the Anglican Communion?

Barbara Harris received death threats before the service, so a contingent of Boston police was assigned to guard it.

Katharine Jefferts Schori, the first woman to lead the Episcopal Church, trained in which science?

Oceanography earned her a master's and a doctorate at Oregon State University before she was ordained in 1994, and she is also an instrument-rated pilot.

Which openly gay priest did the Episcopal Diocese of New Hampshire elect as its bishop in 2003?

Gene Robinson was the first openly gay priest consecrated a bishop in the Anglican tradition, and death threats meant he had to wear a bulletproof vest.

Which co-founder of the National Organization for Women became an Episcopal priest in 1977?

Pauli Murray, a civil rights lawyer, was the first African American woman ordained to the Episcopal priesthood, and in 2024 her portrait was struck on a US quarter.

Which reformer, burned at the stake under Mary I, compiled the first Book of Common Prayer?

Thomas Cranmer had signed recantations before his execution, then renounced them and declared that the hand which wrote them would be burnt first.

Under which monarch did the Church of England, parent of the Episcopal Church, break with the Pope?

Henry VIII had asked Rome to annul his marriage to Catherine of Aragon; when that failed, Parliament declared him Supreme Head of the English church in 1534.

In which Virginia settlement was the first Anglican parish in America founded in 1607?

Jamestown held its first services outdoors under an old sail tied to trees, and the brick church tower later built there is the last structure standing from its years as Virginia's capital.

Which English city is the seat of the archbishop traditionally seen as the Anglican Communion's spiritual head?

Canterbury's archbishop is called first among equals: a focus of unity with no formal authority over Anglican churches outside England, the Episcopal Church included.

Episcopalians picture authority as a three-legged stool: scripture, tradition and which third leg?

Reason completes the image, which is often credited to the Elizabethan theologian Richard Hooker even though the attribution is mistaken.

What do Episcopalians call the elected lay board that runs a parish's finances with the clergy?

Vestry was first the name of the room where clergy robes are kept, and it passed to the parish meetings traditionally held there.

Which Episcopal body meets every three years as a House of Bishops and a House of Deputies?

General Convention is the church's lawmaking body, and every diocese is entitled to send four clergy and four lay people as its deputies.

Episcopal comes from the Greek episkopos, the root of the word bishop, which literally means what?

Overseer is the literal sense, and the same Greek word reached English as bishop by way of Latin episcopus and Old English biscop.

The Episcopal Church approved full communion in 2000 with a bishop-led church of which tradition?

Lutheran and Episcopal churches now recognise each other's members, ministers and sacraments, under an agreement that passed only after an earlier version narrowly failed.

Which gathering of Anglican bishops, held about every ten years, is named after a London palace?

Lambeth Conference resolutions have never carried the force of church law, and only seventy-six bishops accepted the invitation to the first meeting in 1867.

Which Latin phrase do Episcopalians use for Anglicanism's place between Rome and Puritanism?

Via media is Latin for the middle way, a label made popular in the 1800s for a tradition that seeks balance between opposite poles.

Which fourth-century statement of faith do Episcopalians recite at most Eucharistic services?

The Nicene Creed was first adopted at the Council of Nicaea, which the emperor Constantine called in 325, and was expanded at Constantinople in 381.

Which Anglican statement of doctrine, finalised in 1571, did the Episcopal Church adopt in 1801?

The Thirty-nine Articles began as just Ten Articles in 1536 and went through at least five major revisions before reaching their final form.

Eucharist, the Episcopal name for Holy Communion, comes from a Greek word meaning what?

Thanksgiving is the sense of the Greek eucharistia, a name already used for the rite in the Didache, a church manual written around the year 100.

What is the name of the stemmed cup that holds the consecrated wine at an Episcopal Eucharist?

The chalice takes its name from the Latin calix, meaning cup, and church examples are often made of precious metal, sometimes enamelled and jewelled.

At an Episcopal Eucharist, the bread rests on which shallow dish or small plate beside the cup?

The paten is ceremonially cleaned with water, or with water and wine, once the people have received Communion, a rite called the ablutions.

The Eucharist recalls which meal Jesus shared with his disciples on the night before he died?

The Last Supper is where Christians believe Jesus began the rite, giving his disciples bread and wine on the eve of his crucifixion.

Which rite does the Episcopal Church call full initiation into Christ's body, the church?

Baptism, given with water, is one of only two sacraments the Episcopal Church recognises as given by Christ himself; the other is the Eucharist.

Which word of praise do Episcopalians stop saying throughout Lent and bring back at Easter?

Alleluia is the Hebrew Hallelujah, a call to praise the Lord, and churches across Western Christianity fall silent on it for the weeks of Lent.

Which food do Episcopal parishes traditionally serve on Shrove Tuesday, the day before Lent begins?

Pancakes used up the eggs, milk and butter that households once gave up for Lent, and the day's name comes from shrive, to absolve after confession.

What does the thurifer carry in a small metal pot on chains during an Episcopal Eucharist?

Incense smoulders in the pot, called a thurible, whose name goes back to thus, the Latin for incense; the smoke symbolises a sacrificial offering to God.

Which season of about four weeks opens the church year in the Episcopal calendar?

Advent begins on the fourth Sunday before Christmas, so the church's new year arrives about a month ahead of the calendar's; its name is Latin for coming.

Which symbol of the risen Christ is lit from a new fire at the Easter Vigil in Episcopal churches?

The Paschal candle is large and often decorated with a cross, and Paschal itself describes anything to do with Easter or Passover.

Nine small crosses on the Episcopal Church flag are arranged in the X-shaped cross of which apostle?

Andrew is honoured in the blue corner of the flag, where the nine small crosses also stand for the nine original dioceses of the church.

Which navigational symbol is the emblem of the Anglican Communion, signifying its global reach?

The compass rose is centred on the cross of St. George, and one was set into the floor of Washington National Cathedral in 1990.

What is the tall headdress, pointed at the top, that Episcopal bishops wear as a sign of office?

The mitre takes its name from a Greek word for a headband, and two short strips of cloth called lappets always hang down from the back.

Which staff, topped with a shepherd's crook, symbolises an Episcopal bishop's pastoral care?

The crozier casts a bishop as the shepherd of a flock, echoing the image of Christ as the Good Shepherd; pastoral itself comes from the Latin word for shepherd.

Which part of an Episcopal church, where the congregation gathers, is named from the Latin for ship?

The nave is often loosely called the sanctuary, a term that properly belongs only to the area around the altar.

Which Episcopal cathedral in Manhattan, begun in 1892, remains only two-thirds built?

St. John the Divine is the continent's largest church even so; design changes, stoppages and unstable ground earned it the nickname St. John the Unfinished.

Which Tennessee town is home to the University of the South, owned by southern Episcopal dioceses?

Sewanee is also the everyday name of the university itself, to which the playwright Tennessee Williams left his literary rights when he died in 1983.

Which Episcopal Bishop of Louisiana was killed at Pine Mountain in 1864 as a Confederate commander?

Leonidas Polk was nicknamed the Fighting Bishop, and an official portrait shows him in his robes with an army uniform hanging nearby.

Which Episcopal seminarian was shot dead in Alabama in 1965 while shielding the teenager Ruby Sales?

Jonathan Daniels pushed her down and took the shotgun blast himself, and since 1991 the Episcopal calendar has remembered him as a martyr every 14 August.

Which Asian island gained an Episcopal diocese after Chinese Episcopalians fled there in 1949?

Taiwan's diocese was established in 1954, five years after those refugees arrived, and belongs to Province 8 of the US-based Episcopal Church.