Saint Luke's Lutheran Church, once known as The German Evangelical Lutheran Saint Luke's Church, is a historic

Lutheran Lutheranism is a major branch of Protestantism that emerged under the work of Martin Luther, the 16th-century German friar and Protestant Reformers, reformer whose efforts to reform the theology and practices of the Catholic Church launched ...

church located on Restaurant Row at 308 West 46th Street between

Eighth Eighth is ordinal form of the number eight. Eighth may refer to: * One eighth, , a fraction, one of eight equal parts of a whole * Eighth note (quaver), a musical note played for half the value of a quarter note (crotchet) * Octave, an interval b ...

and

Ninth In music, a ninth is a compound interval consisting of an octave plus a second. Like the second, the interval of a ninth is classified as a dissonance in common practice tonality. Since a ninth is an octave larger than a second, its ...

Avenues in the

Theater District A theater district (also spelled theatre district) is a common name for a neighborhood containing a city's theater Theatre or theater is a collaborative form of performing art that uses live performers, usually actors to present experiences ...

Manhattan Manhattan ( ) is the most densely populated and geographically smallest of the Boroughs of New York City, five boroughs of New York City. Coextensive with New York County, Manhattan is the County statistics of the United States#Smallest, larg ...

, New York City.

History

St. Luke's was founded as a

Dutch Reformed The Dutch Reformed Church (, , abbreviated NHK ) was the largest Christian denomination in the Netherlands from the onset of the Protestant Reformation in the 16th century until 1930. It was the traditional denomination of the Dutch royal fami ...

congregation in 1850, first meeting in rented rooms on the third floor of a building on 35th Street and 9th Avenue. It reorganized as a Lutheran congregation in 1853. The church moved several times, acquiring its first owned building, a former Baptist church on 43rd Street, in 1863. It moved in 1875 to 233 West

42nd Street 42nd Street most commonly refers to: *42nd Street (Manhattan), a major crosstown street in the New York City borough of Manhattan It may also refer to: *42nd Street (film), ''42nd Street'' (film), a 1933 American Warner Bros. musical film with lyri ...

, into the former Forty-second Street Presbyterian Church. Finally, the congregation acquired property at West 46th Street to build its current church. The cornerstone was laid in October 1922 and the church dedicated in September 1923. For many years, Dr. Donald Grey Barnhouse, pastor of

Tenth Presbyterian Church Tenth Presbyterian Church is a congregation of approximately 1,600 members located in Center City, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States. Tenth is a part of the Presbyterian Church in America (PCA), a denomination in the Reformed (Calvinist) ...

Philadelphia Philadelphia ( ), colloquially referred to as Philly, is the List of municipalities in Pennsylvania, most populous city in the U.S. state of Pennsylvania and the List of United States cities by population, sixth-most populous city in the Unit ...

and teacher on the radio program, ''The Bible Study Hour'' (now known as ''Dr. Barnhouse & the Bible''), held a Bible class on Monday evenings at the church, which lasted until his death in 1960. Formerly an independent congregation without

synod A synod () is a council of a Christian denomination, usually convened to decide an issue of doctrine, administration or application. The word '' synod'' comes from the Ancient Greek () ; the term is analogous with the Latin word . Originally, ...

ic affiliation since 1880, St. Luke's joined the

Evangelical Lutheran Church in America The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) is a mainline Protestant church headquartered in Chicago, Illinois. The ELCA was officially formed on January 1, 1988, by the merging of three Lutheran church bodies. As of December 31, 2023, it ...

in 1987. Playhouse 46 at St. Luke's, formerly

St. Luke's Theatre St. Luke's Theatre is a 174-seat Off-Broadway theatre at St. Luke's Lutheran Church at 308 West 46th Street, on Restaurant Row, just west of Eighth Avenue in Manhattan's Theater District. Created by then-Pastor Dale Hansen, St. Luke's Theatre ...

, had been located on the church's premises.

Architecture

The church was built in 1922–23 to the designs of Edward L. Tilton of Tilton & Githens, with the facade of the nave featuring windows designed by Francis Xavier Zettler. The building was completed in 1923. The architecture has been described as a happy marriage between the

Gothic Revival Gothic Revival (also referred to as Victorian Gothic or neo-Gothic) is an Architectural style, architectural movement that after a gradual build-up beginning in the second half of the 17th century became a widespread movement in the first half ...

and

Art Deco Art Deco, short for the French (), is a style of visual arts, architecture, and product design that first Art Deco in Paris, appeared in Paris in the 1910s just before World War I and flourished in the United States and Europe during the 1920 ...

styles. A four-story parish house at 308–316 West 46th Street was built 1922 to designs by architect

Francis Keally Francis J. Keally (December 3, 1889 – 1978) was an American architect and pioneering preservationist, based in New York City. Keally's design credits include the Oregon State Capitol in Salem, Oregon in 1938, in a one-time association with Tr ...

of 141 East 45th Street at the cost of $150,000. The church was added to the

National Register of Historic Places The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the Federal government of the United States, United States federal government's official United States National Register of Historic Places listings, list of sites, buildings, structures, Hist ...

in 2007.

References

External links

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Saint Lukes Lutheran Church, New York City Churches in Manhattan Lutheran churches in New York City Hell's Kitchen, Manhattan German-American culture in New York City Churches completed in 1923 20th-century Lutheran churches in the United States 1850 establishments in New York (state) Religious organizations established in 1850 Churches on the National Register of Historic Places in New York (state) Art Deco architecture in Manhattan Gothic Revival church buildings in New York City Properties of religious function on the National Register of Historic Places in Manhattan