Tenth Presbyterian Church is a congregation of approximately 1,600 members located in Center City,

Philadelphia Philadelphia, often called Philly, is the List of municipalities in Pennsylvania#Municipalities, largest city in the Commonwealth (U.S. state), Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, the List of United States cities by population, sixth-largest city i ...

Pennsylvania Pennsylvania (; ( Pennsylvania Dutch: )), officially the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, is a state spanning the Mid-Atlantic, Northeastern, Appalachian, and Great Lakes regions of the United States. It borders Delaware to its southeast, ...

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. Tenth is affiliated with the

Presbyterian Church in America The Presbyterian Church in America (PCA) is the second-largest Presbyterian church body, behind the Presbyterian Church (USA), and the largest conservative Calvinist denomination in the United States. The PCA is Reformed in theology and presb ...

(PCA), a denomination in the Reformed (Calvinist) tradition. It is located at the southwest corner of 17th & Spruce Streets in Philadelphia's

Rittenhouse Square Rittenhouse Square is a neighborhood, including a public park, in Center City Philadelphia. The park is one of the five original open-space parks planned by William Penn and his surveyor Thomas Holme during the late 17th century. The neighborho ...

neighborhood, in the southwestern quadrant of Center City.

History

The original Tenth Presbyterian Church, founded in 1829 as a congregation part of the

Presbyterian Church in the United States of America The Presbyterian Church in the United States of America (PCUSA) was the first national Presbyterian denomination in the United States, existing from 1789 to 1958. In that year, the PCUSA merged with the United Presbyterian Church of North Americ ...

, was located on the northeast corner of 12th & Walnut Streets. It established a daughter church in 1855–1856 called the West Spruce Street Presbyterian Church on the southwest corner of 17th & Spruce Streets. The two churches worked together, with the ministers exchanging pulpits each week. Because of membership decline in the original Tenth Church caused by population shifts, the two churches merged in 1893 at the 17th & Spruce Streets location, taking the name of the older church (Tenth Presbyterian Church). West Spruce Street/Tenth Church was designed by architect John McArthur Jr., who was a member of the congregation. Its tower-and-spire was the tallest structure in Philadelphia from 1856 to the erection of the tower of Philadelphia City Hall in 1894, also designed by McArthur. In 1893, architect Frank Miles Day was hired to perform major alterations to the church's exterior and interior decoration. The church's steeple with its 150-foot wooden spire was weakened due to structural decay of the timber frame, and was removed in 1912 due to fears that it would collapse. The Philadelphia Presbytery (PC-USA) was a conservative bastion during the fundamentalist-modernist controversy of the 1920s and 1930s, and Tenth Presbyterian was no exception. Under the influence of longtime pastor Donald Barnhouse (1927–1960), the congregation became the conservative Presbyterian church in Center City, and it has remained a conservative and evangelical congregation until this day. Under

James Montgomery Boice James Montgomery Boice (July 7, 1938 – June 15, 2000) was an American Reformed Christian theologian, Bible teacher, author, and speaker known for his writing on the authority of Scripture and the defence of Biblical inerrancy. He was also th ...

(1968–2000), the congregation continued to be a center of conservative Reformed theology. Tenth membership continued to grow after World War II, and ministry efforts to college students gave the congregation a metropolitan focus. Tenth pres 17-spruce

Under Boice's pastorate, Tenth grew from 350 members to a congregation over 1,200. In 1979, following a denominational ruling by the

United Presbyterian Church in the United States of America The United Presbyterian Church in the United States of America (UPCUSA) was the largest branch of Presbyterianism in the United States from May 28, 1958, to 1983. It was formed by the union of the Presbyterian Church in the United States of Ameri ...

requiring congregations to elect both men and women as ruling elder, Tenth Presbyterian left the UPCUSA in 1980, joining the more conservative Reformed Presbyterian Church, Evangelical Synod. Three years afterward, Tenth followed the RPCES into the

, a church of Southern origin. After a lengthy property battle, the congregation was allowed to leave the UPCUSA while keeping its Byzantine-style property. Tenth Presbyterian is considered the "big-steeple" PCA congregation in the northeastern United States. The church sponsors an extensive global missions program, and an outreach to the neighborhood includes a strong connection to the rising generation of doctors, interns, and residents attending the medical schools in the neighborhood.

Senior Ministers

Some notable staff members of the church from its founding include: *Thomas McAuley, D.D., LL.D. Senior Pastor. 1829–1833 * Henry Augustus Boardman, D.D. Senior Pastor. 1833–1876 *Marcus A. Brownson, D.D. Senior Pastor. 1897–1924 * Donald Grey Barnhouse, Th.D., D.D. Senior Pastor. 1927–1960 * Mariano Di Gangi, D.D. Senior Pastor. 1961–1967 *

, Th.D., D.D. Senior Minister. 1968–2000 * Philip G. Ryken, DPhil Senior Minister. 1995–2010, now president of Wheaton College
Liam Goligher
D.Min. May 22, 2011 – Present Notable members have included C. Everett Koop, Surgeon General of the United States during the Reagan administration and one-time head of Pediatrics at the

University of Pennsylvania The University of Pennsylvania (also known as Penn or UPenn) is a private research university in Philadelphia. It is the fourth-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and is ranked among the highest-regarded universitie ...

and Children's Hospital of Philadelphia.

Ministries

*Three Sunday services with approximately 1,400 people in weekly attendance
ACTS Ministries
mercy ministries to the poor and homeless near Tenth Church *Tenth College Fellowship is a group for college students, helping them to be connected in the church and to grow spiritually during their college years. *Maranatha is the youth group for students in grades 7–12, begun in 1984 and still continuing to meet weekly on Sunday nights and sponsor other events throughout the year.
Tenth Church Preschool
provides high-quality preschool education, nurturing children through music, literature, learning and play while fostering community for parents. *Medical Campus Outreach is a ministry to medical and other health professional students on medical campuses in and around Philadelphia. *Small group Bible studies meet weekly in host homes across the city of Philadelphia and throughout the suburbs in Pennsylvania and New Jersey *Various other discipleship groups, support groups, and prayer groups meet regularly in the church facilities and elsewhere

References

External links

Official website

Tenth Presbyterian Church
at Philadelphia Architects and Buildings {{Authority control Churches in Philadelphia Presbyterian Church in America churches in Pennsylvania 19th-century Presbyterian church buildings in the United States Religious organizations established in 1829 Churches completed in 1856 1829 establishments in Pennsylvania Rittenhouse Square, Philadelphia