April 26
1478 Two Medici brothers
were attacked by the pope’s men with his knowledge when they
entered church to celebrate Easter mass. The Medici and the
Pazzi families were quarreling over which would handle
Vatican banking. The pope wanted to drop the Medicis.
1521 After
Charles V (1500–1558) promised
to take firmer measures against his doctrines, Martin Luther
left the Diet of Worms. A month later his teachings were
formally condemned.
1834
Horatio Richmond Palmer, American Congregational
clergyman and hymnist, was born in Sherburne, New York (d.
15 November 1907, Yonkers, New York).
1836
Friedrich Carl Theodor Ruhland, German Free Church
pastor, was born in Grohnde, near Hamel, Hannover (d. 3 June
1879).
1847 The Missouri Synod was officially
organized in Chicago at First Saint Paul Church (C. A. T.
Selle, pastor). The first officers elected for a term of
three years were C. F. W. Walther, president; Wilhelm Sihler,
vice-president; F. W. Husmann, secretary; and F. W. Barthel,
treasurer (funds amounted to $118.32 and 3/4 cents). Der
Lutheraner was adopted as the official church
publication, and the seminary founded in Fort Wayne,
Indiana, through the efforts of Wilhelm Löhe
was accepted by the synod.
1868
Franz Friedrich Wilhelm Jakob (aka Francis James) Lankenau,
Missouri Synod vice-president and church leader, was born in
Fort Wayne, Indiana (d. 15 July 1939).
1877 Residents of Minnesota observed this
date as a statewide day of prayer, asking for deliverance
from a plague of grasshoppers that had been ravishing
thousands of acres of farm crops that year. The plague ended
during that summer. The prayer at first did not seem to
"work" because warm temperatures over the next two days
caused millions of larvae to wiggle to life, but a plunge in
temperature on the fourth day froze and killed all of the
wrigglers.
1900
Conrad Sigmund Fritschel, who helped found the Iowa
Synod and served as a professor in its seminary, died (b. 2
December 1833, Nürnberg).
1955 The Roman Catholic television program
Life Is Worth Living was broadcast for the last time
on Dumont television. Premiering 12 February 1952, it was
one of the most successful religious programs ever to air on
television. It won its host, Bishop Fulton J.
Sheen (1895–1979), an Emmy
Award in 1952 for "the most outstanding personality" on
television.
1968 The
Lutheran Synod of Mexico was formally initiated.
1970
Paul Wilbert Lapp, Lutheran professor and archaeologist,
died (b. 5 August 1930, Sacramento, California).
1992 Worshipers celebrated the first
Russian Orthodox Easter in Moscow in 74 years.
