"Bishop John Burgress"{March 11,1909-Augusta 24,2003}

In 1962 the Right Rev.John Melville Burgress became the first African American to lead an Episcopalian congregation in the U.S. He was installed as a suffragan bishop in one of the oldest congregations in the American Episcopal Church,located in the center of Boston and worked to bring the church's focus onto social issues and progressive causes."I just wanted to prove that the Episcopal Church could be relevant to the lives of the poor,"Episcopal Times writer Tracy Sukraw quoted him as saying.John was born in Grand Rapids,Michigan.His daddy hailed from Ohio,and worked as a waiter in the dinning cars of the Pere Marquette Railroad in Michigan.From him,John inherited the Episcopal faith.John's mama was from Grand Rapids,and had been educated as a kindergarten teacher.The family attended St.Philip's Episcopal Church,an African-American church in the western Michigan Episcopal diocese,where John served as an alter boy.The Episcopal Church differed from the African American Methodist Episcopal (AME) Church,founded in 1816 as an offshoot of the Methodist Church.John's church Episcopal was considered the church of the American elite for generations.It was part of the Anglican Communion of churches,along with the church of England,and its religious rituals on North America soil dated back to 1607 and the Jamestown colony.The colonial-era American congregation split from England's Anglican church during the Revolutionary War period,and in 1789 reconstituted itself as the Protestant Episcopal  Church.Well into the twentieth century,its membership ranks included the names of some of the wealthiest and well-connected American families.Eleven presidents have been Episcopalian,the largest number of and creed.John studied at Grand Rapids Junior College before following a neighbor,fellow Episcopalian and future American president,Gerald R.Ford,into the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor.John earned his undergraduate degree in social work there in 1930 and a master's the following year.Social work attracted him because he viewed it as a way to help others,he eventually decided that entering the ministry would provide a more solid foundation though which work with the poor.He journed to Cambridge,Massachusetts,and entered the Episcopal Theological School there.After finishing his divinity degree in 1934,he returned to St.Philip's in Grand Rapids for his ordination in July of 1934.He was also assigned to a post at St.Phillip's,which he held for the next four years until transferred to a parish outside outside of Cincinnati.He was assigned to the Mission of St.Simon the Cyrene in Lincoln Heights,which was a racially divided town and a poor,hardscrabble one as well."The experience made me very angry,"John recalled in a Grand Rapids press interview,according to writer Cami Reister."I came to believe that racism like that simply could not continue in a country as enlightened and as rich as this.I tried to give the community some moral fiber.I tried to give them more than just jobs or streetlights.I tried to raise them to a standard of living based on the Gospel."With this mission in mind,St.Simon's new vicar established a medical clinic,social services center,and a day school;he also worked with the local labor leaders in an attempt to integrate the nascent auto unions of the area.John had found  mentor at the Episcopal Theological School in Cambridge,Angus Dunn,who became bishop of Washington ,D.C. in 1942.Angus invited John to serve as an attempting presbyter for services at the landmark National Cathedral there,which was a first for an African American Episcopal priest.In 1946,Angus was instrumental in helping John obtain the Episcopal chaplainry at  Howard University,the prominent African American school in the nation's capital He served as chaplain for the next decade,and his concurrent directorship of the Canterbury House,the Episcopal student center at Howard,introduce him to many students from around the world who would return to become leaders in their respective African or Caribbean nations.John was a canon of the Washington National Cathedral after 1951,the fist African American to hold such a position there,ad used his pulpit to speak on issues of racial segregation and the burgeoning civil-rights movement.His growing profile attracted the attention of elders in the Boston diocese,who made him an archdeacon and installed him as head of what was then known as the Boston City Mission in 1956.The Mission worked with the poor in the city and served not just as a spiritual beacon but as a liaison with social agencies.It was a time when many venerable Episcopalian parishes in the heart of Boston were losing members as city dwellers moved to the suburbs,and John believed it was important that the older churches find new ways to appeal to people from all walks of life."I think they any church in a poor urban area which says they can go at it alone has not developed a big enough program," Tracy's article in the Episcopal Times quoted him as once saying."Their program ought to always be bigger than their resources."In September of 1962,diocesan of gathering of John's fellow priests elected him suffragan bishop.The event even made the New York Times,which ran a photo of him under the headline,"Negro Is Elected Episcopal Bishop."He became the first African-American priest to lead an Episcopal congregation in the United States."Integration is part of the ordering community,"he told the newspaper's John H.Fenton,speaking of the Episcopal Church's outreach program to increase and diversity its membership roster."Individuals ought to be able to accept one another as people in racial,economic and nationality areas.This will be the test."For the rest of the decade John also served as assistant bishop to the head of  the Massachusetts diocese,the Right Reverend Anson Phelps Stokes.When Anson announced his retirement,John was elected to succeed him.He was installed on January 17,1970,at Boston's Cathedral Church of St.Paul.He added yet another first,as the first African American to head an Episcopal diocese.His was the largest in the United States at the time,and John continued to encourage his subordinates into embracing social progressivism and making the church a model integration.After he retired in 1975,he taught pastoral theology at Yale University's Divinity School,and edited a 1982 collection Black Gospel,White Church,a collection of sermons delivered by black priests dating back nearly two decades.Since the 1960s,John had served as a summer minister at the Grace Episcopal Church on Martha's Vineyard,the Massachusetts resort community.He moved there permanently in 1989,with his wife Esther TaylorBurgress.The pair had met at a church conference in North Carolina,married in 1945,and had two daughters Julia & Margaret.Esther was also committed to civil-rights causes,even taking part in an attempt to integrate a restaurant in St.Augustine,Florida,in 1964 during which she and the mama of Massachusetts's governor were arrested.On the occasion of John's 90th birthday in 1999,a stained glass window was installed at Grace Episcopal in his honor.The window feature his likeness as well that of his role model,Absalom Jones,the former slave and Philadelphia minister who was the first African American to serve as a priest in the Methodist Episcopal Church.John died on Martha Vineyard.He was a longtime NAACP member,and the president of the organization's Boston branch,Leonard C.Atkins,called him" a spokesman for equal rights,"as reported by New York Times obituary writer Eric Pace."He gave the encouragement to so many people of color to make the next step forward and not to be afraid.He was a beacon and a drum major for all people."St.Philip's Episcopal Church--where he went from altar boy to rector-- broken ground on the John M.Burgress Wellness Center in his honor in the spring of 2004.