St. Timothy's Church, Roxborough is a parish of the
Episcopal Diocese of Pennsylvania
The Episcopal Diocese of Pennsylvania is a diocese of the Episcopal Church in the United States of America encompassing the counties of Philadelphia, Montgomery, Bucks, Chester and Delaware in the state of Pennsylvania.
The Diocese has 36,641 ...
in the
Roxborough neighborhood of
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States. It is part of the Wissahickon Deanery of the Diocese of Pennsylvania. In 1962, St. Timothy's reported membership of 1,144 and weekly attendance of 849, while its 2022 reported attendance was 32 persons.
It was founded in 1859 by lay members of
St. Mark's Church, Locust Street with a
Tractarian High Church ethos including free pew sittings. The first services were conducted by a priest from St. David's Episcopal Church in
Manayunk. Financial difficulties required the adoption of a pew-rental system in 1863. The parish had a historically
Anglo-Catholic character, adopting an early weekly celebration of the Holy Communion in 1869, with the main Sunday service becoming Holy Communion in 1909. In 1893 the Anglo-Catholic
Sisterhood of the Holy Nativity
The Sisterhood of the Holy Nativity (SHN) is an Anglican religious order for women founded in 1882 by Charles Chapman Grafton SSJE. Three sisters and six novices of the Society of St. Margaret (SSM), associated with the Cowley Fathers, left SSM in ...
, affiliated with the Cowley Fathers (
Society of St. John the Evangelist
The Society of St John the Evangelist (SSJE) is an Anglican religious order for men. The members live under a rule of life and, at profession, make monastic vows of poverty, celibacy and obedience.
SSJE was founded in 1866 at Cowley, Oxford, Eng ...
) began work in the parish and at the adjacent St. Timothy's Hospital.
The cornerstone for the church building was laid on July 18, 1862 by Bishop
Alonzo Potter. The church was consecrated by Bishop
William Bacon Stevens on February 14, 1863, as one of his early official episcopal acts. Its architect was
Emlen T. Littell, who also built New York's
Church of the Incarnation,
Zion Episcopal Church, Palmyra, New York,
St. Paul's Episcopal Church, Poughkeepsie and many other buildings with a parish Gothic style. A vandal attempted to blow up the church in 1899 using its municipal gas-light supply.
The studios of Victorian Anglo-Catholic stained glass artist
Charles Eamer Kempe (1837-1907) designed the majority of the church's windows as memorials to members of the local Merrick and Cope families. The
stations of the cross
The Stations of the Cross or the Way of the Cross, also known as the Way of Sorrows or the Via Crucis, refers to a series of images depicting Jesus Christ on the day of Crucifixion of Jesus, his crucifixion and accompanying prayers. The station ...
are the work of
Thorsten Sigstedt (1884-1963), a Swedish American woodcarver with studios in
Bryn Athyn, Pennsylvania. The first burials in the adjacent cemetery, which is active in 2022, began in 1863. A two-manual organ by
Frank Roosevelt
Franklin Delano Roosevelt (; ; January 30, 1882April 12, 1945), often referred to by his initials FDR, was an American politician and attorney who served as the 32nd president of the United States from 1933 until his death in 1945. As the ...
(Opus 367) was installed in 1887; in 2006 a 1967 Wicks/1997 Buzard organ with three manuals, 32 stops, 36 ranks from First Baptist Church in
Decatur, Illinois
Decatur ( ) is the largest city and the county seat of Macon County in the U.S. state of Illinois, with a population of 70,522 as of the 2020 Census. The city was founded in 1829 and is situated along the Sangamon River and Lake Decatur in Ce ...
was installed.
Rectors
# John Leighton McKim 1860-1862
# Samuel Hall 1863-1867
# William Augustus White 1867-1877
# Robert Evans Dennison 1878-1907
# James Biddle Halsey 1908-1919
# Sidney Atmore Caine 1919-1930
# George Herbert Dennison 1930-1934
# Edmund Bacon Wood 1934-1952
# John Robert Rockett 1952-1958
# Theron Adair Vallee 1958-1960
# Eugene Francis Lefebvre 1960-1992 (died 2018)
# Charles J. Blauvelt
# Kirk T. Berlenbach 2003-2017
# Bonnie McCrickard 2018—2023
See also
*
St. David's Church, Manayunk
*
Church of St. Alban, Roxborough
The Church of St. Alban, Roxborough is a parish of the Episcopal Diocese of Pennsylvania in the Roxborough, Philadelphia, Roxborough neighborhood of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. It was founded in 1859 as a chapel of ease of St. David's Church, Mana ...
*
St. Peter's Episcopal Church of Germantown
*
St. Alban's Church, Olney
St. Alban's Church, Olney was a church of the Episcopal Diocese of Pennsylvania in the Olney section of North Philadelphia. Through the ministry and influence of its most significant rector, Archibald Campbell Knowles (1865-1961), St. Alban's was ...
References
*John C. Manton, ''A Splendid Legacy: St. Timothy's, Roxborough, 1859-1984'' (Parish history, © 1984)
*John C. Manton, ''Death Certificates for Some of the Interments in Saint Timothy's Churchyard, Roxborough, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 1863-1915'' (St. Timothy's Church, 2014), two volumes
External links
Official parish websiteInstagram accountHistorical material on St. Timothy's Church
from Philadelphia Studies
Pipe Organ Database
Roosevelt Opus 367
1967 Wicks / 1997 Buzard OrganEpiscopal Diocese of Pennsylvania
{{DEFAULTSORT:Saint Timothy's Episcopal Church, Roxborough
1859 establishments in Pennsylvania
Christian organizations established in the 1850s
Churches in Philadelphia
Episcopal Church in Pennsylvania
Religious organizations established in 1859
19th-century Episcopal church buildings