Monday, August 10, 2026

It is the 10th of August 2026. Welcome to the Christian History Almanac, brought to you by 1517 at 1517.org; I’m Dan van Voorhis.

 

A very happy Monday to you all- as is our wont on this show- Monday’s are for the mailbag. And there is a very special hotline for questions… it is top secret- quite elite, actually. And sometimes I have friends use it to ask questions- like my man Chris White… I use both his names to make sure you go see his film “Electric Jesus”- a kind of That Thing You Do meets Jesus Music and the 80s.

 

Chris is from Greenville, South Carolina- home of both Shoeless Joe Jackson and the Reverend Jesse Jackson… no relation, I don’t think.

 

Chris was watching the funeral service for Glen Hansard- the Irish busker turned star with the movie and later musical “Once”- an absolute favorite movie of mine- a very tragic story- but quite the beautiful ceremony.

 

Well, Chris was watching and had to write to me and say, “What’s up with the Irish church… It’s like Protestant, but kinda Catholic- and they hate the English, so I doubt they bow down to Canterbury.

 

The story of the Church in Ireland is actually on the board for its own weekend edition- because Chris picked up, in that funeral in a Church of Ireland, that something is different with those cats…

 

Ok- here’s big point number 1: there is a very realistic alternate history of Christianity where the center of the western church is not Rome, but Ireland. One of the most important early synods in the church- the Synod of Whitby in 664 asked the question of whether or not the ancient Irish churches- which predated St. Patrick- should align themselves with Rome and follow its practices. The synod agreed to submit the church to Rome. After Viking and then Norman invasions, the once mighty church was a shell of itself.

 

In the 1530s, the Irish Parliament- following its English neighbors decided to make Henry the head of their own church- finally eschewing Rome 900 years after Whitby. Except, the Irish remained largely Catholic. They were rural, spoke a different language, and were generally ignored if they didn’t cause a fuss.

 

It was in the following century that the Ulster Protestants began to flood the north of Ireland- these were Protestants- English and Scottish, moved into Ireland to help make it Protestant. It didn’t work. In fact, if you have heard of the “Scotch-Irish,” these were Ulster Protestants who made their way from Ireland to the American colonies.

 

So- you have the “Church of Ireland,” which is protestant but makes up only about 12% of the population in the 1800s. The plan that went into place was a disestablishment of the Church of Ireland- and a reconstitution of the church that still acknowledged its place in the “Global Anglican Community”.

 

So, here’s the tricky part- the church of Ireland is part of the Global Anglican Community, that is, one of the 42 provincial church bodies in the Anglican communion- BUT, it is autonomous (maybe even “autocephalous”- a favorite term here at CHA)- so it is not governed by the Archbishop of Canterbury- it has its own general synods and elects its own archbishops.

 

Wait… a chance to use another big word for funsies… the church of Ireland has been autocephalous since its disestablishment in the 1800s- that is, it’s no longer the “official church of the state”- that was a loss for the anti-disestablishmentarianism movement. Another reason the Church of Ireland couldn’t really be an “established state church” like the Anglicans- since the division of Ireland into Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland, the Church of Ireland remains the same in both- is that it is a church that crosses that sometimes tenuous border.

 

Thanks, Chris, for the question about the church of Ireland and for a heads-up to check out the Glen Hansard funeral- R.I.P to the singer gone far too soon.

 

The Last word for today comes from the daily lectionary and from Psalm 28:

To you, Lord, I call;
 you are my Rock,
 do not turn a deaf ear to me.
For if you remain silent,
 I will be like those who go down to the pit.

Hear my cry for mercy
 as I call to you for help,
as I lift up my hands
 toward your Most Holy Place.

Praise be to the Lord,
 for he has heard my cry for mercy.

The Lord is my strength and my shield;
 my heart trusts in him, and he helps me.


My heart leaps for joy,
 and with my song I praise him.

The Lord is the strength of his people,
 a fortress of salvation for his anointed one.

Save your people and bless your inheritance;
 be their shepherd and carry them forever.

 

This has been the Christian History Almanac for the 10th of August 2026 brought to you by 1517 at 1517.org.

The show is produced by a man who knows that it’s pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis- that’s the longest word… It’s a lung disease… he is Christopher Gillespie.

The show is written and read by a man who swears I’ve used that word on this show before… similar context? Man, we’ve made a lot of these shows…. I’m Dan van Voorhis.

You can catch us here every day- and remember that the rumors of grace, forgiveness, and the redemption of all things are true…. Everything is going to be ok.