31 May. Our 12th rector, The Very Rev. Pamela L. Werntz, was ordained to the priesthood in our diocese by The Rt. Rev. Thomas M. Shaw, SSJE. Having graduated from the Episcopal Divinity School, she was sponsored for ordination by Christ Church, Cambridge, whose rector The Rev. Robert Tobin was her mentor.
Timeline of History at Emmanuel
2001
Roof and other post-fire repairs began.
Dec. Under the editorship of Nelina Bachman Emmanuel News was published with its new name, Voices.
2000
Priscilla Rawson Young in the 1990s. photo: Eric Roth
19 June. Priscilla Rawson Young died in Needham MA and was buried in the Rawson plot at Skiff Mountain Cemetery, Kent CT. Our angel bequeathed $100K to sustain our mission and $1M for our music program. The Young Fund today supports Emmanuel Music‘s series of Bach cantatas, which can be heard in our services on Youtube and on Sundays in our sanctuary during the academic year. See also 1909 1939, 1942, 1971, 1973 & 1994.
Nov. 12. A devastating fire due to faulty wiring near our sacristy was reported by women in Safe Haven. The Burnham Window, designed by the English firm of Heaton, Butler & Bayne, was broken by firefighters. Given in memory of Marian Burnham, who drowned at a young age, the window has been restored by Serpentino Studios thanks to a generous grant from the George B. Henderson Foundation.
Photo credit: Don Kreider
1999
- Common Art began meeting. Administered by Ecclesia Ministries, it meets every Wednesday from 10am – 2pm in our parish hall. Please see G. Jeffrey MacDonald’s They made me an artist.
- Nov. 17. Safe Haven, a shelter for abused women, opened.
1998
- August 1. Nancy Granert began as organist.
- Scenes of The Proposition with Kenneth Branagh as priest were filmed at Emmanuel.
1997
The Rev. William Blaine-Wallace met Rabbi Howard A. Berman and began working together as the struggle for marriage equality began to unfold in Massachusetts.
Stephen Babcock welcomed congregants to our sanctuary for more than twenty years.
Having arrived in our parish in the early 1970s, Stephen Babcock served on our vestry for two years under the Rev. William Blaine Wallace. Then following The Rev. Hugh Weaver’s suggestion, he began to serve as usher and welcome congregants on Sundays. His ministry that was to last more than two decades until the Covid pandemic put an end to it. Standing outside what we now call the Babcock Doors in all seasons, he greeted each parishioner by name and helped newcomers find their way. His smile and kindliness be remembered by all who have been privileged to know him.
1996
Our first website was launched by Donald Kreider, who later served as vestry member, clerk, and treasurer.- The Rev. Dr. Deborah Little Wyman launched what became Ecclesia Ministries. She described her first efforts in a Baccalaureate address, “After two years of hanging out on park benches, subway stations, heating grates and train tunnels in Boston, during the week before Easter 1996, I had the idea that we could actually have an outdoor worshipping church. I sensed people were waiting to be gathered. That Easter I set up a folding table on Boston Common and 10 brave souls came.”
Ecclesia today sustains common cathedral, common art (which meets at Emmanuel on Wednesdays), and Boston Warm (which meets at Emmanuel on Mondays and Fridays).
See also: Timeline 1995. - Oct. 28. The Rev. William Blaine-Wallace was installed as 11th rector.
1995
The Rev. Dr. Deborah Little 
Wyman, who was sponsored by Emmanuel, was ordained to the priesthood by the Rt. Rev. Barbara Harris, the Episcopal Church’s first woman bishop. She describes her “Journey to Street Priesthood” on common cathedral’s website. See also 1996.
1994
John Harbison; photo credit: Julian Bullitt
John Harbison dedicated to our benefactor Priscilla Rawson Young his memorable setting of 1 Corinthians 11:23-5 as “Communion Words“, which we sing with his other service music in Lent.
James Primosch composed “Meditation for Candlemas”, first of several motets based on the poetry of Denise Levertov, who attended Emmanuel in the 1980s. It was sung in our service on Feb. 1, 2015. Here is the text of “Candlemas” from her collection Breathing the Water (NY: New Directions, 1987). Continue reading
1989
April 8. Emmanuel Music gave a concert in honor of Principal Guest Conductor John Harbison’s 50th birthday (20 Dec. 1988). His wife Rose Mary Pederson Harbison opened with a violin concerto she had played at its 1980 premiere.- Katharine Ward Lane Weems died and bequeathed a pair of Spanish candelabra now standing in the baptistery of our Sanctuary. Born 22 Feb.1899, she was the only child of Emma Gildersleeve and Gardiner Martin Lane, who was chairman of the Board of Trustees of the Museum of Fine Arts from 1907 until his death in 1914. They lived at 53 Marlborough Street and were members of Emmanuel.
Katharine attended the Museum School from 1915 and began to show her work in 1920. She designed the brick friezes and bronze doors of Harvard’s Biological Laboratories with two massive bronze rhinoceri (one pictured below) installed in the courtyard in 1937.
See also
- Gardiner Martin Lane
- Her other works including the Dolphins of the Sea at the New England Aquarium and the Lotta Fountain on Boston’s Esplanade.
- Finding aid (with biography) for her papers at the Schlesinger Library, Radcliffe
- Her Odds Were Against Me: A Memoir as told to Edward Weeks (NY: Vantage Press, 1885)
Image by Daderot, WikiCommons, of her sculpture at the Museum School, Boston