Author: Susan George

In the early 1700s, religion was in decline in the British Atlantic world. Two centuries of near-constant religious warfare and intellectual and emotional conflict over the right way to worship and know God left Europe bloodied and exhausted in the wake of the Protestant Reformation. As scientific understanding grew, many people wondered if religion was merely a harmful superstition that could be left in the past. 

The Enlightenment and the Great Awakening

The Enlightenment, or the Age of Reason, emerged partly from this disillusion with religion. In longer estimates, this era lasted from 1680-1820, a period known as the Long Eighteenth Century. Working from a generally secular mindset, Enlightenment thinkers valued rational thought and logic and developed systematic processes for organizing knowledge and understanding the world. 

Theologians (especially those based at major universities) were not immune to the influence of the Enlightenment. During this time, the Protestant religious experience became more institutional and less personal. This perhaps suited those disposed to systematic study, but it proved less popular with the people in the pews and church attendance dropped.

Partly in response to the Enlightenment, a religious revival called the Great Awakening swept the British Atlantic world in the 1730s and 1740s. The Great Awakening was characterized by revivals in which charismatic itinerant preachers worked attendees into an emotional fervor leading to an awareness of personal sinfulness and need of salvation to escape eternal damnation. Great Awakening preachers emphasized the need for a personal, often emotional, conversion experience and a personal relationship with God and downplayed the importance of religious institutions.

It’s tempting to think of the Enlightenment as a secular movement and the Great Awakening as a religious movement. However, that ignores the complexity of the times and the personalities involved, especially among Presbyterians, as the traditional Presbyterian emphasis on education required clergy to undergo rigorous academic training, typically at institutions steeped in the values of the Enlightenment.

Presbyterians had long regarded formal study and its resulting knowledge to be both the primary qualifications for ministers and the primary path to knowing God. At the time of the Great Awakening, ordination required education at a divinity school and subscription to the Westminster Confession. Presbyterian ministers could receive training at the University of Edinburgh, and later at Harvard or Yale. Most Presbyterian ministers in North America either emigrated directly from Scotland or Ulster or traveled there for their education. Even an education at Harvard or Yale removed potential clergy members to New England, far from the centers of Presbyterian population in the Mid-Atlantic colonies.

The Old Light/New Light Schism

Under these conditions, it’s not surprising that fully qualified Presbyterian ministers were scarce in the colonial backcountry, where Scots-Irish Presbyterian communities pressed against the eastern side of the Appalachian Mountains from Pennsylvania to Georgia. The lack of called pastors left many pulpits open to itinerant preachers. These men often had not met the requirements for ordination or received permission from the local presbytery to preach to congregations under its care, and they generally preached the gospel according to the Great Awakening.

Predictably, conflict arose, not only among the Presbyterians but among all Protestant denominations in North America. Those members of the clergy and the laity who continued to hold study and knowledge as the primary way to know God and who continued to value the corporate nature of the church and the processes of the institution became known as “Old Lights.” On the other hand, “New Lights” believed that knowledge of God was revealed by the Holy Spirit through a personal conversion experience that saved the converted person’s immortal soul. They privileged the personal relationship with God over participation in a religious community.

In the battle for hearts and minds, Old Lights favored the mind, while New Lights favored the heart. Both clergymen and congregations took sides. (Sometimes the conflict is referred to as “Old Side” and “New Side.”) Each group bitterly accused the other of leading people astray.

In 1741, the year Derry Church acquired a land grant from Thomas and Richard Penn, the Synod of Philadelphia broke into Old Light and New Light factions, and a slim majority of Old Lights managed to evict the New Lights from the synod. (Moderates, perhaps uncomfortable with the way the eviction played out, chose to depart with the New Lights.) The conflict centered on two issues: itinerant preaching and ministerial qualifications. If that sounds dull, the personalities involved were anything but. Marilyn Westerkamp writes, “An outsider might well think that this reasonably small population and geography could have been managed by a single synod, but such an observer would be forgetting the large personalities involved—personalities too vibrant, too doctrinaire, too righteous, to govern themselves together” (3).

One of those personalities belonged to William Tennant, Sr., who arrived from Ireland in 1718. Within ten years, he opened a small, informal school that offered the only training for Presbyterian ministers south of New England. Scoffed at as the “Log College” by those who doubted its ability to produce qualified ministers, Tennant’s school emphasized New Light values. Filled with their mentor’s evangelical piety, Tennant’s students often preached outside their own jurisdictions, sometimes even preaching to congregations with called pastors. 

In another blow for the Old Lights, by the 1730s, pastors who were unable to secure calls in Scotland and Ireland looked to the North American frontier for positions. From an Old Light point of view, both these circumstances meant that unqualified pastors were able to gain membership in presbyteries, where they exercised the same amount of power as anyone else. In other words, the vote of a graduate of the Log College counted the same as the vote of a graduate of the University of Edinburgh. These were the major issues at play in 1741. 

Nor were these issues confined to Presbyterians. Across British Colonial America, clergy and congregations of all denominations self-identified as Old Light or New Light and reached across congregational and even denominational lines to align with those who shared their beliefs.

In Derry’s own Presbytery of Donegal, almost every congregation either left the presbytery entirely or split along Old Light-New Light lines. Derry Church experienced its own schism in these years. As the battle between Old Lights and New Lights was largely a battle between strong personalities, the dates of Derry’s schism indicate that something similar happened here. 

Derry Church’s Schism

In 1741, Derry’s first called pastor was in the ninth year of a “harmonious and spiritually profitable” tenure (“Reverend William Bertram”). Derry Church was lucky to get William Bertram. In many ways, Bertram seems to have been the ideal Presbyterian minister for his era. He was educated at the University of Edinburgh and served in Ulster for many years before immigrating to North America for personal reasons. He had a long career prior to the upheaval of the Great Awakening, and perhaps he served as a stabilizing force. However, the fact that his salary was not always paid suggests disagreement, if not outright dissension, with church leadership. Lawsuits of the era indicate that the laity were known to withhold salaries in an attempt to control clergy. In any case, while Bertram was alive, Derry mostly weathered the schism in the larger church. Still, as early as 1745, Derry’s New Light faction attempted to bring in an energetic, talented young preacher newly arrived in the Susquehanna Valley.

Upon Bertram’s death in 1746, the New Light majority at Derry Church called John Roan. Roan could not have been more different from Bertram. For a start, he was 43 years younger and of a different generation and mindset. His early training as a weaver also indicates a class division. Born in Ulster in 1717, he immigrated to Pennsylvania in his early twenties. He received his training at William Tennant’s Log College and earned a reputation as a troublemaking preacher in Virginia before arriving in the Presbytery of Donegal.

During Roan’s tenure, Derry became a solidly New Light congregation. The Old Light minority left to join an Old Light majority at Paxton Presbyterian Church, which had been served by John Elder since 1738, after an overworked Bertram asked to be relieved of his duties to that congregation in 1736. Like Bertram, Elder was born in Edinburgh and educated at the University of Edinburgh and had emigrated to join family members. Roan served several local New Light congregations, including Derry, until his death in 1775. Synod records indicate that Roan’s career was marked by “points of difficulty” (“Reverend John Roan”). He appears to have been a polarizing figure, and he left all the congregations he served with deep debts.

Reconciliation

The actual divisions between Old Light and New Light clergy were never as deep as they appeared, or as their impassioned preaching must have had their congregations believe. While there were extremists on both sides, a strong contingent of moderates remained, and they served as peacemakers who succeeded in bringing the estranged factions together only 17 years after their initial split. Reconciliation came as tempers cooled, as some incalcitrant personalities joined the church triumphant, as some New Light ministers became alarmed by the extent of the emotional piety they had unleashed among the laity, and as some Old Light ministers found themselves able to compromise.

The Synod of New York and Philadelphia’s Plan of Union of 1758 attempted to address the issues of ministerial qualifications and itinerant preaching that split the Presbyterians in 1741. Some of its major points are familiar to us today:

• Candidates for ministry must produce evidence of education and theological knowledge as well as an experience of personal salvation through grace.
• Clergy must not attack each other publicly but follow the appropriate disciplinary process if they feel a colleague is in error.
• Clergy must ask permission of the called pastor or the presbytery (in case of a vacancy) before preaching outside their own congregations.

Finally, the Plan of Union affirmed the Great Awakening as “a gracious work of God, even tho’ it should be attended with unusual bodily commotions…whenever religious Appearances are attended with the good Effects above mentioned, we desire to rejoice in and thank God for them.” (Synod of New York and Philadelphia qtd. in Westerkamp 15).

Perhaps the most significant indicator of reconciliation was the recognition, upon reunion in 1758, of both sides of the schism of the College of New Jersey (later Princeton University) as an acceptable location for ministerial education. Founded by New Lights in 1747, that institution’s first decades were marked by instability. However, with the recruitment of Jonathan Witherspoon in 1768, the Presbyterians finally had a leader of national prominence who could serve as a unifying symbol as the head of a respected educational institution located in the heart of North American Presbyterianism.

Derry Church experienced its own reconciliation. Upon the death of John Roan in 1775, Derry called John Elder. Thirty years after the churches along the Swatara split into Old Light and New Light congregations, they reunited. John Elder served as pastor of both churches until his retirement in 1791. For another century, Paxton and Derry would frequently be served by the same pastor.

Division has always been a part of Presbyterian—and American—life and history. As we live through our own era of deep division, may it encourage us to know that reconciliation is also part of our story.

Bibliography

Fea, John. “In Search of Unity: Presbyterians in the Wake of the First Great Awakening.” The Journal of Presbyterian History (1997-) 86, no. 2 (2008): 53–60. http://www.jstor.org/stable/23338196.

“Reverend John Elder (1706-1792)” Church Timeline. Derry Presbyterian Church (USA). 2024. https://www.derrypres.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/12/Elder.pdf

“Reverend John Roan (1717-1775).” Church Timeline. Derry Presbyterian Church (USA). 2024. https://www.derrypres.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/12/Roan.pdf

“Reverend William Bertram (1674-1746).” Church Timeline. Derry Presbyterian Church (USA). 2024. https://www.derrypres.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/12/Bertram.pdf

Synod of New York and Philadelphia, Minutes, 22 May 1758, printed in Klett, ed., Minutes of the Presbyterian Church, 340-43, citation, 342.

Westerkamp, Marilyn. “Division, Dissension, and Compromise: The Presbyterian Church during the Great Awakening.” The Journal of Presbyterian History (1997-) 78, no. 1 (2000): 3–18. http://www.jstor.org/stable/23335294.

Just as an oak tree grows from a small, sprouted acorn to an enormous, sturdy tree, our church has rooted and grown into the vibrant, healthy family of faith that we know today. I invite you to our hymn festival commemorating the 300th anniversary of Derry Presbyterian Church on March 17 at 4:00 pm. The Sanctuary Choir and Derry Ringers will sing and ring the great hymns of faith in celebration of our rich history.

Under the direction of acclaimed conductor, Linda L. Tedford, we will sing psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs that have been published in every Presbyterian hymnal dating from the 1551 Genevan Psalter until the present Glory to God hymnal, which we currently use. Our Sanctuary walls will resonate with the joyous sounds of a full orchestra, including brass, strings, woodwinds, percussion, our mighty Aeolian-Skinner pipe organ, and the Lee Ann Taylor Memorial Steinway and Sons Concert Grand Piano.

We begin our concert giving thanks for Almighty God’s divine providence as the choir processes in with Tom Trenney’s setting of Earth and All Stars, and the Old Hundredth Psalm Tune, arranged by Ralph Vaughan Williams, for choir, brass, organ, and timpani.  From the Genevan Psalter of 1551, we sing I Greet Thee, Who My Sure Redeemer Art, often attributed to John Calvin, and more commonly known as Lord of All Good. We pray that God will be glorified through musical pillars, such as How Firm a Foundation, Praise Ye the Lord, the Almighty, Guide Me, O Thou Great Jehovah, and A Mighty Fortress is Our God.

Modern lyricist and hymn writer David Gambrell commissioned a new text in honor of Derry’s tri-centennial to the Irish folk tune, Londonderry Air, entitled In Jesus Christ There is a New Creation. Our choir is honored to share this new hymn in its world premiere. In keeping with our Celtic roots, we are led to sing Be Thou My Vision, set to the traditional Irish tune, Slane.

Derry Ringers will envelop you with the sounds of bronze as they present Te Deum Laudamus, a riveting setting by Cathy Moklebust, and Crown Him with Many Crowns, elegantly arranged by D. Linda McKechnie. Other choral works featured are Allen Pote’s beautiful arrangement of The Lord is My Shepherd, and American composer Aaron Copland’s interpretation of the spiritual Shall We Gather at the River. The choir will conclude the program with John Rutter’s benediction, The Lord Bless You and Keep You.

I invite you to join us under the oaks for an afternoon of worship-filled hymn singing, as we glimpse the pages of our history through songs of faith and stories of our founders.  Let us worship together through music and the spoken word, giving thanks to God for 300 years of ministry on these sacred grounds.

Editor’s Note: On the first Thursday of each month, the eNews feature article highlights the mission focus for the month. In March we’re lifting up the One Great Hour of Sharing offering. 

Millions of people around the world lack adequate housing, clean water, sustainable food sources, education, and the opportunity to manage their own affairs. For 75 years the Presbyterian Church (USA) has come together in the season of Lent to support the One Great Hour of Sharing (OGHS) and to help improve the lives of people and communities struggling to overcome these challenges. The OGHS Offering at Derry is shared equally with three programs administered by PCUSA and Bridges to Community (BTC), a non-profit organization with long ties to Derry, who are building homes in the Dominican Republic. 

The three PCUSA programs supported by OGHS are: Presbyterian Disaster Assistance, Self-Development of People and the Presbyterian Hunger Program. 

PRESBYTERIAN DISASTER ASSISTANCE (PDA) is well-known for its rapid response to national and international disasters by supplying funds to help initiate the recovery process. Through its long-term partnerships with several Middle East church councils, PDA has been able to respond to the recent earthquakes in Syria and Turkey and humanitarian needs in the Ukraine and Israel and Palestine.  

PRESBYTERIAN HUNGER PROGRAM (PHP) is working to alleviate hunger and eliminate the root causes. Some of this is accomplished through providing animals, bees, and seeds, promoting better crop selection and agricultural methods, fair trade practices, and family gardens. PHP also seeks to supply better and more nutritional foods, secure loans for income-producing projects, tree planting, establish wells for clean water, and sanitation systems, as well as addressing labor and environmental pollution issues. 

SELF-DEVELOPMENT OF PEOPLE (SDOP) works in partnership with people in low-income communities in the United States and around the world to overcome oppression and injustice. The aim is to invest in communities responding to their own challenges of oppression, poverty and injustice, thus helping them to develop solutions to their particular problems in areas such as youth-led activities, disabilities, farming, skills development, and immigration/refugee issues.  

Derry has been involved with Bridges to Community since its founding more than 30 years ago, in building new homes in Nicaragua and the Dominican Republic and providing Bible school activities for the community. In June we will return to the Dominican Republic to help build a house for a needy family. By working with the family, local masons, and community members, a safe and secure house can be completed in about one week. Additionally, with the BTC model, new homeowners are encouraged to pay into their local community fund, which can then be used by the community at their discretion for selected improvement projects. 

The Mission and Peace Committee has set a goal of $19,000 for this year’s OGHS Offering. You may give online or by check payable to Derry Church and notated OGHS. Place it in one of the OGHS envelopes available in the pew racks, and drop the envelope in an offering box. Taken together, your contributions to the OGHS Offering, with our goal of $19,000, will enable both PCUSA and BTC to assist many needy people with the opportunity to improve their quality of life. Thank you, Derry, for your generous support! 

On a recent Saturday morning, I opened my inbox and read about how a respected  New York Times journalist was scammed out of $50,000 for answering a call on her cell phone from someone “calling to check unusual activity on her Amazon account.” 

The next article that popped up told about a social media post in which Jennifer Aniston promised to sell MacBook Pro computers for just $10. These scam videos on Facebook and Instagram used audio deepfakes of celebrities like Elon Musk, Oprah Winfrey, Tiger Woods, Kylie Jenner, and Vin Diesel to hawk fake product giveaways and investment opportunities.

Then there was a weekend last month when many of you reached out to Pastor Stephen because you received suspicious emails that looked like he sent them, but were really phishing emails from bad actors trying to hook you into falling for a scam. 

As these bad actors refine the uses of artificial intelligence, all these kinds of scams will become more prevalent and more difficult to spot. What can you do to protect yourself? 

First, be skeptical of every email, text message, and phone call you receive. Look carefully at the email address: is it really from the person claiming to send the message? If you can set your cell phone to block unknown callers, do it. If it’s an important call from someone not on your contact list, the person will leave a message that you can return right away. 

Whenever an unknown caller asks for personal information or claims to be from your bank or a provider you use, HANG UP IMMEDIATELY. Then YOU call your bank or the provider and ask if they are trying to reach you. 

Next, don’t just delete junk mail that comes into your inbox: instead, send it to your junk or spam folder. That action trains your mailbox to learn what is junk and what is legitimate email. It’s good practice to go into your junk/spam folder every week or two and scan through those messages to make sure it’s not holding good emails. Send the good stuff to your inbox (or mark as “not junk”) and erase the rest.

I’ve been very pleased with Gmail as an email provider. It’s free and does an excellent job of keeping junk mail out of my inbox. If you are using Verizon, AOL, or Comcast as your mail provider, I urge you to close that account and move to Gmail. Yes, it’s a hassle to make the change, but in the long run well worth the effort. You can do it in small steps over time, and before you know it, you’ll have made the switch.

Topics like these come up every week in Tech Time, the Zoom gathering I’ve been hosting every Monday afternoon from 1-2 pm since the pandemic started in 2020. Some regulars have been with me from the beginning, and new folks drop in regularly to ask a question or share a good idea they’ve learned. I love having the opportunity to learn something new every week, because I sure don’t have all the answers. Together we’ve tackled questions about using cell phones and iPads, tested new Zoom features, discussed whether password managers are a good idea (yes!), learned how to take screenshots and how to use CarPlay, and much more. Recently Derry member Lauren June dropped by and presented an excellent tutorial on Pinterest. 

I invite you to join us on any Monday afternoon that works in your schedule:  just click this link. You’re welcome to drop in, ask a question and duck out, or stick around for the hour.  If there’s a topic you’d like to know more about, let me know and we’ll make it happen. 

Tech Time started as a way to practice using Zoom when it was new to all of us, and it’s continued because technology is constantly evolving and changing, and it’s not easy for any of us to keep up. Just having a forum to share frustrations, ask questions, and learn how to stay safe has been helpful. I hope you’ll join us.

“Neighbor” is an idea that we are familiar with.  A very well-known story about being a neighbor is the Good Samaritan. Mr. Rogers asks, “won’t you be my neighbor?” The language of neighbor is common, but like many frequently used words, the depth of meaning can be lost in the frequency of use.  Two pivotal questions we can glean from the Good Samaritan story in Luke are, “who is our neighbor?” and “how do we love our neighbor?” These questions are very important for us and for the church to consider.  

Often, we think in terms of membership and how to incorporate others into our community. However, being a neighbor does not require incorporation. We see this with the Samaritan man as he stays the Samaritan man throughout the entire story.  We also understand neighbor to mean a person or group who is close to us, or those with whom we are most likely to interact. Our current age of interconnectedness would have this definition include all people. The Guardian wrote an article where researchers checked 30 billion electronic messages and found that we can be connected to anyone through 6.6 people, beginning with someone you know.  

By studying billions of electronic messages, they worked out that any two strangers are, on average, distanced by precisely 6.6 degrees of separation. In other words, putting fractions to one side, you are linked by a string of seven or fewer acquaintances to Madonna, the Dalai Lama and the Queen. (Smith, 2008)

The ways in which we interact with the world are vastly different now than 30 years ago as we have entered this age of connection where millions of people are accessible through the phone in our pocket.

While the number of our neighbors have grown, I wonder if the way we are to love them has stayed the same. How do we as individuals or as a church love our neighbors? The Samaritan recognized the needs of his neighbor and provided for him.  Fred Rogers created a television show with the message that we are all valuable and special. 

There is a special story about Fred Rogers learning about and providing for the needs of another. Fred Rogers would feed his fish on every show, and while he fed his fish, he would narrate that he was feeding his fish. He began narrating this without any public explanation. It was later understood that Fred Rogers received a letter from a concerned little girl who was blind and worried that Mr. Rogers’ fish were hungry because she never heard him feeding them. Mr. Rogers responded to this by making sure to narrate his feeding of the fish so the little girl would not worry.  

Every situation is unique and there is not one prescription for how to love all our neighbors. However, if we look and listen to those we share the world with, we will find many opportunities to be a good neighbor. 

Facing religious discrimination and economic and political pressure in Ireland in the early 18th century, thousands of Ulster Scots saw a dismal future with little hope of providing a good life for their families. Their Presbyterian faith led them to believe that by working hard and following Christian practices, God would give them a good life. 

Across the Atlantic Ocean, William Penn had established a colony founded on the practices of religious toleration, participatory government, and “brotherly love.” Scots-Irish immigrants learned that Pennsylvania had opportunities and available land to free them from the financial, social, and political difficulties they faced in Scotland and Ireland. 

William Penn founded his colony on Quaker principles of non-violence and religious toleration and believed white Christians, indigenous Christians, and non-Christians could live peacefully together. 

In 1682 Penn purchased land from the Lenape tribe and hoped to sell it to settlers to pay off his debts. He also desired to foster trade with the Native Americans and establish a military defense for residents. In his book, Peaceable Kingdom Lost, historian Kevin Kenny noted that after the Great Agreement of 1701, Penn and the Conestogas promised to live together peacefully. The humane treatment of the indigenous people was an essential segment of Penn’s vision. 

Around 1700, the Ulster Scots began leaving Ireland for a new life in Pennsylvania. Arriving in Philadelphia and Delaware ports, it did not take long for them to feel unwelcome. The Quakers who ruled the new colony did not always follow Penn’s practice of absolute religious toleration. Numerous restrictions were placed on non-Quakers, limiting their full participation in the colony’s political, social, and economic life. 

Since most of these immigrants were tenant farmers, living in and around Philadelphia did not offer the opportunities they desired. At this time,  Pennsylvania’s frontier was 40-50 miles west of Philadelphia, including what later became Lancaster and Lebanon counties. 

Many Indian trails crisscrossed the rolling hills and forests. Such an Indian trail passed near the spring that ran behind Derry Church. The trail stretched from the Manada Gap to the headwaters of the Conewago Creek. These trails were rough and rocky. However, the determined Presbyterian, Mennonite, River Brethren, and Moravian immigrants made their way westward in increasing numbers. So many were coming, and their arrival seemed like a swarm of bees. 

While Penn insisted on legitimately purchasing Indian lands, these newcomers felt the land was theirs. “It was against the laws of God and nature that so much land should be idle, while so many Christians wanted it to labor on and to raise their bread,” wrote Israel Daniel Rapp, in his 1847 book, History and Topography of Northumberland, Huntington, Mifflin, Union, Columbia, Juniata, and Clinton Counties, Pennsylvania. 

Settlers occupied the hills around the settlements in Pennsylvania. They marked their property by cutting their initials in trees on the boundary of what they considered theirs, then cut circles in the bark to kill the tree. They refused to pay the Native Americans for the land, believing that God owned it.

According to historian Luther Kelker, the settlers would build a church soon after clearing some land, building simple dwellings, and planting crops. The farmers often did not remove tree trunks and roots, and simply planted them with crops set out around them. They often planted various grains, beans, peas, and turnips.

The settlers kept goats, pigs, cattle, sheep, and a horse or two for plowing. As time passed, settlers often built grist mills and tanneries, with distilleries often added later. Colonial wives spun flax, milled the corn, worked in the fields, while bearing and raising large families of up to 10-15 children. 

Days were long and strenuous, but the men would gather at the tavern to  exchange stories and catch up on local and international news . Magisterial courts met there, and the taverns often served as polling places. 

While German farmers were frugal, well-organized, and interested in improving the land, the Scots-Irish settlers were not known for being good stewards of the land. They often farmed the soil while it was fertile and then moved westward when the soil stopped being productive. 

While working to create a good life on the frontier, immigrants saw the need to establish a church. In the early 1720s, at least three Presbyterian congregations began gathering for worship. For the Derry congregation, at first worship was held outside, by a spring. At times, worship services would be held in homes. 

As the Presbyterian congregations grew, these new worship communities requested formal recognition as a congregation from the Presbytery. After several years of meeting without the leadership of an ordained minister, members of Derry Church applied to Donegal Presbytery In 1729 to be recognized as an established church and to request that they be served by an ordained minister. In response, Donegal Presbytery directed Reverend James Anderson, then serving as Pastor to Donegal Springs Presbyterian Church, to attend to Derry Church every fifth Sunday. 

In 1732, when Derry called its first pastor, Reverend William Bertram, a small log building, the Session House, was erected. In 1734, a second structure was built to serve as a sanctuary. In 1769, a larger structure the “Old Derry” Meeting House was constructed. 

On the frontier, the church became an important social center. People traveled long distances to attend day-long worship services often held just once per month. Services began around 10 a.m. and included two sermons, hymns, and prayers. Between discourses, adults lingered in small groups discussing local happenings while children and youth enjoyed playing with each other. At noon, the entire congregation settled underneath the trees to enjoy picnics brought from home. 

Presbyterian ministers were hard to find on the frontier. The Presbyteries required ministers to have a classical education, including theology, Greek, and Latin before they could be considered for ordination. If the itinerant preachers did not have this background, the Presbyteries required them to return to Scotland to study at Edinburgh University. Once Princeton was established (1746), most ministers received their training there. 

Because of the shortage of qualified ministers, it was common for a clergyman to serve more than one church. Reverends James Anderson and William Bertram, Derry’s earliest ministers, both served several congregations, often visiting newly established congregations a few times a year, in addition to their more regular service to their called church. 

During these years, social, economic, and political challenges were plentiful. While most descendants of the Scots-Irish settlers moved on as the soil became less productive, they left an enduring heritage in this area. Building upon their religious and political views, they laid the foundation for our new nation and the challenges ahead.

For further reading:

Kelker, Luther Reilly. History of Dauphin County, Pennsylvania. United States: Lewis Publishing Company, 1907. 

Kenny, Kevin. Peaceable Kingdom Lost: The Paxton Boys and the Destruction of William Penn’s Holy Experiment. New York: Oxford University Press, 2009. 

Rapp, Israel Daniel. History and Topography of Northumberland, Huntington, Mifflin, Union, Columbia, Juniata, and Clinton Counties, PA. (1847)

Over the past several months, Jill Peckelun and I have had the privilege of working with Derry’s 3rd-5th graders on a picture book history of Derry Church. We are often joined by Pam Whitenack, who answers many questions about Derry’s history on the spot, and Kristy Elliot, who provides student support. 

Plans for this project emerged last year as the Derry 300 Committee imagined ways to include children’s voices in the Derry 300 celebrations. During the 2023-24 program year, Jill and I have met with an average of about ten children per week during Creation Time on Tuesday evenings to write and illustrate the story of Derry Church. 

We decided to tell the story through the evolution of Derry’s physical space. 3rd-5th graders are just developing the capacity for the kind of abstract thought that deep study of history requires, so we decided to connect all the abstract names, dates, and ideas to a space they already knew well and now know even better—their own church.

We divided our project into several topics. So far we have written and illustrated pages about the Session House, Spring, and Cemetery, Old Derry, and the John Elder Memorial Chapel. Jill and I have developed the following process for researching, illustrating, and writing about each topic. 

First, we do a site visit to a relevant location in the church to draw from life, or we draw from pictures in Derry’s archives. Jill takes the children’s sketchbooks and painstakingly selects images from each of the children’s drawings to create a composite collage. Next, the children use crayons to add color to the composite image. Jill then repeats the process, creating the final image by scanning and collaging the color images. We’d like to thank Sue George for lending her technical expertise to aspects of this process.

Through this process, I’ve been able to introduce some of the concepts of historical work, including primary sources (those contemporary to the period under study) and secondary sources (those created later from primary sources). Primary sources used on this project include photographs, artifacts, and of course, the building itself. For our secondary source, we rely on Bobbie Atkinson’s April 27, 2023 Long Read, which details the history of our buildings. We begin our study of a particular topic by reading the relevant portions of this article to get a general overview, and we revisit it throughout our study.

To produce the text, I begin by listening to the children talk as they work. Sometimes I ask them questions about what they are drawing and why. I note what they tell me. Toward the end of the process, I ask, “What did we learn? What do we feel is important for others to know?” I note that down, too. Finally, I take all the language they have given me and shape it into a narrative.

My star word for 2024 is delight, and it has truly been a delight to work on this project. Here are a few of the standout moments:

• Taking the children outside to sketch the Session House, Cemetery, and Spring. It was such a blessing to hear their kind words for the saints resting in our cemetery, those they knew and those who lived long ago. Several of them asked if there was any way to go inside the Session House, so we are working on possibilities for taking them in one or two at a time when it is safe. I have learned that kids love the Session House! (It’s a little house under glass in the parking lot. Who wouldn’t?)
• Participating in a Tuesday night worship service. In November, Pastor Stephen led a Tuesday evening worship in the Chapel with communion. The kids sat around the chancel to sketch the artifacts that remain from Old Derry, including furniture and the pewter communion set. 
• Watching the kids get so excited about artifacts from the Heritage Room! We meet in Room 6, which is conveniently located next to the Heritage Room. It was such a joy to see the kids show so much interest in the various objects Pam Whitenack pulled out one evening and debate with each other and us about their possible uses.
• Helping a table of kids study images of the Chapel to put them in chronological order—an activity they began spontaneously out of their own interest.
• Meeting with a small but dedicated group the night of a snowstorm to tour the chapel with Pam and ring the bell.
  

It’s not often in life you realize you’re doing one of the most important things you’ll ever do while you’re doing it, but I have experienced that feeling while working with these children on this project. 

Jill and I are often astounded by the children’s work, by their wisdom and talent. Looking with new eyes, they often show us things we missed. I hope that the children who work on this project will take the skills and confidence and knowledge they’ve gained into whatever they do next and into their eventual vocations. I don’t call this a children’s book, because it isn’t just for children. It’s a picture book, and picture books are for everyone. 

You’ll have your opportunity to pre-order this one in the spring. In the fall, we will celebrate the book’s arrival with a book launch party at a special post-worship fellowship.

Thank you for your support of the children and this project. To learn more, check out the bulletin board across from Room 6 or ask a 3rd-5th grader about their experience. We look forward to sharing the book with you.

Editor’s Note: On the first Thursday of each month, the eNews feature article highlights the mission focus for the month. In February we’re lifting up homelessness and our mission partner, Family Promise of Harrisburg Capital Region.

Steve came to Family Promise HCR with his 12-year-old son and two-year-old daughter. They had spent the last year in a hotel, and the expense chewed through their savings. The next step was living in his car, which would place him in danger of losing custody of his children. 

That’s when they applied to Family Promise HCR. He entered the program in a very stressed state, with a constant knit in his brow. Unfortunately, stories like his are not unique.

Family Promise HCR has spent the last year:

• Housing 14 families, including 23 children. 
• Beginning the UP programs in July 2023:
  • Move UP assists with back rent and security deposits: 23 families benefited.
  • Wheels UP provides funds for car repairs and back car payments: seven families benefited. 
  • Heads UP assists with mental health visits for those who have experienced homelessness.
• Working with 100 individuals looking for work, as a program management site for the United Way’s Road to Success program.

Our UP programs and Road to Success help divert families from homelessness. This is so important, because once a family has an eviction, it is much harder for them to find a landlord willing to rent to them.  

We don’t do this alone. We are a part of over a dozen coalitions or groups throughout the area representing hundreds of partner service organizations. This includes the Brethren Housing Association (BHA), where we hold a Road to Success “Job Club” and Capital Area Coalition on Homelessness, where Stacey Coldren, our Program Director sits on the board. We work with the Healthy Steps Diaper Bank to receive diapers for our guests. And we partner with organizations including Christian Churches United to share resources whenever possible, like the over abundance of hats and scarves we received and donated to the Overnight Women’s Shelter. 

Our families stay in our Day Center during the day, and in the evening stay at our network of ten host congregations. They transform three rooms into a cozy space to shelter our families in the evenings, and provide an evening meal and hospitality.

Steve graduated from the program. A local congregation that wanted to use one of its rental properties for mission work rented to him and his family. They gave him a reduced rate and took a chance on his rough credit report. This month it’s been one year since the move and the family is thriving! No more knit in his brow.

Last week, we discussed how Presbyterians from southern Scotland migrated to Ulster, Ireland’s northernmost province, and became known as the Ulster Scots. To summarize, in the early 1600s, England determined to strengthen its grip on Ulster through a policy of plantation (or settler-colonialism). English landlords found tenants for their holdings among the Presbyterians of southern Scotland, for whom repeated crop failures and religious persecution made Scotland a difficult place to live. Some Scottish Presbyterians settled in Ulster on the chance life might be easier there, but some were forced to emigrate. 

Now we’ll look at how many Ulster Scots found themselves emigrating a second time in relatively short order, not simply across the narrow channel that divides Ulster from southern Scotland, but across the Atlantic Ocean.

The Siege of Londonderry
Toward the end of the 17th century, Ireland became a minor theater in a larger struggle known variously as the War of the League of Augsberg, the War of the Grand Alliance, the Nine Years’ War, King William’s War, and the War of the Three Kings (1688-1697). To summarize, the French Catholic monarch Louis XIV sought to extend his power and smaller (largely Protestant) nations banded together to stop him. 

Louis XIV was the first, and certainly the most powerful, of the three kings referenced. The two others were the Catholic James II of England (also James VII of Scotland) and Protestant Dutch Prince William of Orange. William was both James’s nephew and son-in-law, as he was married to his first cousin, James’s daughter Mary. 

Despite persecution from Protestant reformers, the Catholic presence in England had never disappeared. After Oliver Cromwell’s death, his Commonwealth government collapsed and the Stuart dynasty was restored to the English throne in the person of Charles II, son of the executed monarch Charles I. While Charles II produced many children with his mistresses, his marriage was childless, so his openly Catholic younger brother James inherited the throne upon his death in 1685. 

When James’s Catholic second wife gave birth to a son in June 1688, panic arose among Protestants across both islands at the thought of a Catholic dynasty. When William of Orange invaded England in November 1688, the English army and navy supported him and James escaped to France.

In England, Parliament declared that James had abdicated through desertion and offered William and Mary the crown as co-regents ruling as William III and Mary II. James attempted to reclaim his throne by bringing a French army to Ireland. In Ireland, the larger-scale European conflict between Protestant and Catholic powers played out between Jacobite (Latin for James) forces who favored the Catholic James II and VII’s claim to the thrones of England, Scotland, and Ireland and Williamite forces who favored William of Orange.

As Protestants, the Ulster Scots were firmly in the Williamite camp. The Siege of Londonderry is probably the most lauded moment in Ulster Scots history. In 1689, they made their most famous stand as they held the walled city of Londonderry against Jacobite forces for 105 days at great personal cost, contributing mightily to William’s ultimate victory at the Battle of the Boyne in 1690. 

In the ensuing years, many more Presbyterians left Scotland to join the Ulster Scots Presbyterians in Ireland. Alas, any belief that their contributions to the Williamite victory would lead to political and religious equality with Anglicans was short-lived. By 1704, the more religiously tolerant (and perhaps grateful) William III was dead, along with his wife and co-regent Mary II. In that year, the Test Acts went into effect, requiring all public office holders to produce a certificate stating they had received communion in an Anglican church, effectively barring Presbyterians from government. 

Emigration to North America
In the 18th century, many elements combined to make emigration to North America attractive to the Ulster Scots. The Crown and the Anglican Church regarded their marriages as invalid, excluded them from public life, and required them to pay additional taxes. They were accustomed to religious intolerance, and that alone might not have induced them to leave Ulster. But crop failures, rising rents, and a string of economic crises made the prospect of a new land more appealing. 

Kevin Kenny writes, “Presbyterians began to leave Ulster for America in large numbers at the turn of the eighteenth century. They left in pursuit of land and religious toleration, the two goals that had brought their Scottish forefathers to Ulster over the previous three generations” (27). In the early decades of the eighteenth century, Pennsylvania was the most religiously tolerant of Great Britain’s North American colonies, an appealing prospect for dissenters from the Church of England, including Presbyterians. (In 1707, the Treaty of Union established the Kingdom of Great Britain as a sovereign nation by uniting the Kingdom of England, which included Wales from 1542, and the Kingdom of Scotland.)

In 1718, large-scale Ulster Scots migration to North America began with the departure from Derry Quay of five ships carrying several congregations of Presbyterians led by their ministers. Landing in Boston, they found the long-established Puritan inhabitants hostile. As early as 1700, noted Puritan minister Cotton Mather had declared attempts at Ulster Scots settlement in New England to be “formidable attempts of Satan and his Sons to Unsettle us”(28). By 1724, the traditional date of Derry Church’s founding, new Ulster Scots immigrants to North America had learned to look for homes further south, a process facilitated by close ties between Belfast merchants and Delaware ports.

For the third time in history, the people who had been the Lowland Scots and who had become the Ulster Scots, would take on a new frontier and a new name. “On both sides of the Atlantic, Ulster Presbyterians served as a military and cultural buffer between zones of perceived civility and barbarity, separating Anglicans from Catholics in Ireland and eastern elites from Indians in the American colonies. What they wanted above all else was personal security and land to call their own” (3). In North America, the Ulster Scots became known as the Scots-Irish, and would again serve as a human shield between elite colonizers and indigenous people, at the mercy of, and ultimately reviled by, both.

This was the world into which Derry Church came into being, a world whose true nature has been cloaked over time in the myth of brave and hearty frontiersmen and women. No doubt some of them were brave and hearty, and certainly most of them clung to their own interpretation of the Presbyterian faith as a comfort and a guide in a world in which their lives were likely to be short and difficult and to end messily. Conditions on the North American frontier were brutal, and the choices these largely impoverished and repeatedly oppressed people faced were often no choice at all. Sometimes their migration was forced. Often they were lied to about the opportunities awaiting them on the opposite side of a perilous sea voyage.

The Ulster Scots who made their way to North America were victims of the generational trauma of living a hardscrabble existence on frontiers, between warring forces, their homes never secure, their lives perpetually at risk. By the time they came to the place they called Derry Church, they were ready to fight for their own security, whether that meant fighting the people who were already here or the elites who forced them onto the frontier.

Perhaps for our 300th Anniversary, we can give our forebears the gift of seeing them truly, with the mix of pride, shame, and compassion which is the legacy of most of the people who have walked this earth.

Further Reading: The best secondary source on this topic is Kevin Kenny’s Peaceable Kingdom Lost: The Paxton Boys and the Destruction of William Penn’s Holy Experiment, from which the above quotations are taken.

Spend enough time around Derry Church, and you’ll hear the story of how our earliest members emigrated from Ireland to Pennsylvania in the early 1700s, founding a church here around 1724. In this first piece, I’m taking you deeper into the past, to an earlier migration that is just as deserving of a place in Derry’s collective memory. 

The Protestant Reformation
Derry’s story begins with the Protestant Reformation. In 1517, priest and theologian Martin Luther published his 95 Theses, challenging the teachings of the Catholic church and inadvertently igniting the religious reform movement known as the Protestant Reformation. Religious groups in conflict with the Catholic church soon came into conflict with each other, ultimately producing the many denominations of Protestantism known to us today, including Presbyterianism.

While the Protestant Reformation occurred across Europe, events in England are most significant for Derry. In 1534, the infamous English monarch Henry VIII broke with the Roman Catholic Church and established the Church of England, or Anglicanism. Henry VIII’s concerns were political, not religious. While the English monarch replaced the pope as the head of the church, Anglicanism remained similar to Catholicism. 

Henry VIII’s actions produced two significant outcomes in England. First, it left serious religious reformers interested in a change in church substance, not just in name and leadership, dissatisfied. Second, by creating a national church, it explicitly tied religious identity to national identity. Those who didn’t support the national church might find themselves under suspicion of not supporting the nation—and by extension, the monarch who was head of both.

Scottish Presbyterianism vs. English Anglicanism
Meanwhile in Scotland, Protestant zealot John Knox spread the teachings of Swiss theologian Jean (or John) Calvin. In Scotland, national identity became linked to Calvinism, a theology most fully expressed in Presbyterianism. The first General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church was held in Edinburgh in December 1560. Over the next century, an early form of Presbyterianism comprised of a combination of Anglican, Puritan, and Calvinist theology, structure, and process spread throughout southern Scotland. (The much-mythologized Highlands and its clans remained overwhelmingly Catholic and separate from the Lowlands. They are not a significant part of Derry Church’s story.)

In 1603, James VI of Scotland inherited the throne of his cousin Elizabeth I of England, making him both King of Scots and King James I of England. (The two remained separate nations, but James was king of both, reigning as James VI of Scotland and James I of England.) James had been baptized Roman Catholic and raised Presbyterian, but he understood that his throne and his global power depended on that of the more powerful nation of England and its Anglican church. This led to a series of attempts by James and his heirs to “Anglicize” Scottish Presbyterianism and bring the two nations into closer alignment.

In 1637, attempts by James’s son Charles I to impose Anglicanism in Scotland led to riots in the Presbyterian stronghold of St. Giles’ Cathedral in Edinburgh. A more measured response to Charles I’s actions came in the form of the Scottish National Covenant of 1638, which declared Presbyterianism to be the only true form of church government and aligned Scotland with Presbyterianism and the principles of the Protestant Reformation. Over 300,000 Presbyterians in Scotland and Ulster signed it. 

The Presbyterian Migration to Ulster
Where is Ulster, and what were Scottish Presbyterians doing there? To answer that question, let’s start with a little geography.

Ireland is the name of a nation, but it’s also the name of an island, and the two aren’t exactly the same. Today, the separate nations of the Republic of Ireland (commonly called “Ireland” and a completely independent nation) and Northern Ireland (which is part of the United Kingdom) share the island of Ireland. 

Ulster is one of the four traditional provinces that make up the island of Ireland. Northern Ireland is comprised of six counties in Ulster. But three of Ulster’s counties are in the Republic of Ireland. The island’s traditional provinces predate English interference and have no present-day political existence or administration—and what existed in the past wasn’t especially strong. It might be helpful to think of these traditional provinces as similar to regions—such as New England, the Southeast, the Midwest—in the United States. These areas have a shared history and culture, but they aren’t political entities.

Okay, back to the history:

English monarchs had been claiming Ireland since at least the 1100s, but much of their power was in name only. In the early decades of the 1600s, the English Crown’s attempts to rule Ireland in fact as well as in name led to the systematic plantation of Ulster, the northernmost province of Ireland that had always been the most difficult to bring under English control. In this context, “plantation” is a verb, not the noun we’re used to using to refer to large antebellum farms in the American Southeast. In essence, plantation involves driving the native inhabitants off the land you want and replacing them, or simply overwhelming them, with your own people. England used this method (which is very similar to what is today called “settler-colonialism”) to great effect for centuries, with Ulster as their proving ground. 

So why did the Plantation of Ulster occur when it did? With much of Ulster abandoned by native Irish leaders as a result of conflicts early in the 1600s, English interests were able to swoop in and sell the abandoned land to new (mostly English) landlords. In need of tenants to make their new holdings profitable, these landlords looked to the Lowlands of Scotland, where years of crop failures and religious persecution for their Presbyterian faith made promises of better land and greater religious toleration in Ulster attractive. Some of these Scottish settlers in Ulster chose migration—to the extent that trading probable starvation for possible starvation is a choice. However, some were forcibly transplanted. 

In addition to their vulnerable state as a mostly poor and marginalized group, Lowlander Scots held a particular attraction for their new landlords. For centuries, their families had inhabited the constantly contested borderlands of England and Scotland. They were accustomed to making their homes between violently antagonistic forces. This was key, because the land they settled on was not empty. Ulster had been abandoned only by its elites. Many native Irish remained, clinging to their Catholic faith in the face of persecution from both English Anglican landlords and Scottish Presbyterian tenants.

The Black Oath
When those 300,000 Presbyterians in Scotland and Ulster signed the Scottish National Covenant of 1638, the English Crown responded with what became known as the “Black Oath.” It required every Protestant in Scotland and Ulster over the age of sixteen to swear allegiance to the king and reject the Scottish National Covenant. The Black Oath turned the Ulster Scots community against Charles I, adding to the controversial monarch’s many enemies. The 1640s, a decade of bloody unrest on both islands, ended with the king’s execution in 1649. 

When the dust of migration and war finally cleared around 1660 there were three major religious groups in Ulster: displaced and oppressed Catholics, looking to Rome and the Catholic monarchs of continental Europe for redemption; land-owning Anglicans, loyal to the restored monarch Charles II and the Church of England; and a tenant class of Protestant Dissenters, of which Scottish Presbyterians made up the largest part and whose numbers were increasing. 

Indeed, while there had been plenty of Scottish Presbyterian settlements in Ulster in the first half of the 1600s, the greatest numbers, including many Presbyterian ministers, migrated to Ireland during the second half. All told, perhaps a quarter of a million people migrated from the island of Great Britain (England, Wales, and Scotland) to the island of Ireland by 1700, most of them to Ulster.

These migrants to Ulster from Lowland Scotland—Scottish, Presbyterian, Dissenters — became known as the Ulster Scots. Stay tuned next week to discover how they became known in North America as the Scots-Irish.

Further Reading: This article provides an extremely simplified overview of a complex historical process. Jonathan Bardon is a major authority on the history of Ulster. His book, The Plantation of Ulster (2011) is the standard source. If you’re not interested in reading a whole book but want to learn a bit more, check out the Ulster-Scots Agency.

Image credit: Wdcf, CC BY-SA 3.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0>, via Wikimedia Commons

We are nearing the end of a season of wonder and I confess I have never ceased to be amazed at the number of projects and their huge impact for our local and worldwide communities that Derry undertakes. I say this because my first church was a small congregation in western Pennsylvania where I remember hearing adults talk about “living link missionaries.” These missionaries seemed to be far away, so I wondered: where were these missionaries and what did they do there?

My experience of mission at Derry has vastly enlarged my understanding of how we, individually and collectively, are a link to others.  I am thinking especially of the ministry of the Presbyterian Education Board (PEB) in Pakistan, which Derry members have been supporting — first in small ways beginning in 2009, and now in significantly substantial ways through a variety of fundraising endeavors and the personal involvement of many.  This is about education for the most needy in Pakistan, where government-run schools are inadequate and where many children could suffer lifelong illiteracy. 

Derry’s Shares for Scholarships campaign, under way now and continuing through February, supports the education of children in PEB schools. Last year 54 folks at Derry raised $23,200 in scholarship funds that are benefiting 55 children who attend PEB day and boarding schools. It is my good fortune and a blessing to be able to send Adan, a little guy who is a day student, to nursery school. His letter from 2022 tells me that his favorite subject is English and that he wants to be an engineer. Wonderful! 

Derry members support the work of PEB through Friends of the Presbyterian Education Board here and across the country.  There are now three schools  in Sargodha (a large city of about 660,000 people) that serve more than 1,000 boys and girls who are Christians and Muslims. An annual scholarship is $400 for a day student and $800 for a boarding student. A share is any amount you might wish to allow God, though you, to support the education of a child.

I believe we are truly God’s links to youngsters who will have hope of a better future, a chance to rise out of poverty, and the promise of becoming educated citizens who are prepared to serve their communities and the world. A card from PEB reminded me of Hebrews 6:1, “God is not unjust: God will not forget your work and the love you have shown him as you have helped God’s people and continue to help them.” 

I invite you to join me by becoming a link of God’s love to one of God’s children by giving online or by sending checks to Derry Church notated “Pakistan Scholarships.” 

Editor’s Note: On the first Thursday of each month (or close to it), the eNews feature article highlights the mission focus for the month. In January we’re lifting up women’s equality, justice and opportunity through the good work of our mission partner, Bethesda Women and Children’s Mission in Harrisburg.

My first visit to Bethesda Women’s Shelter was easily 25 years ago. It was a dark, cramped building that had once been a school. We shared our love by preparing a luncheon and sharing a meal together. Over time, Derry members visited and learned about their programs and needs, and we planted colorful geraniums in a narrow strip of grass between the sidewalk and the road.

Now the Shelter has been replaced on the same site by a light-filled interior space surrounded by outdoor views that allow women to thrive in a Christ-centered facility. Bethesda offers hope to those searching for their purpose and their place in this world. 

On completion of a year-long Discipleship and Recovery program, women have the option to move into a Transitional Living Program before moving out on their own. Because many of the women have addictions to drugs and alcohol, and may have been living in domestic abuse situations, it is important for program participants to commit to sobriety. Bethesda offers prayer, a discipleship program, counseling — individual and group — and 12-step Christian recovery groups and meetings. Children may stay with their mothers at the shelter so their bond can be maintained and strengthened. Parenting classes are available, and everyone has access to financial and budgeting instruction to help round out their life skills.

Since their education may have been interrupted, Bethesda can assist participants in obtaining local social, medical, and educational services to help them set and reach attainable goals during their stay. Some women, after completing Bethesda’s programming, either return to the work force or continue their education at a local college. Many of the graduates remain in contact with the shelter through calls, mentoring, or as volunteers.

Derry has shared our love with them as well as our mission funds over the years. Look for opportunities in the near future for you  to share your time and talents, too!