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Christian History

Today in Christian History

September 13

September 13, 1541: John Calvin returns to Geneva, where he will spend the rest of his life trying to establish a theocratic society at the request of city authorities who banished him three years earlier (see issue 12: John Calvin).

September 13, 1635: The Massachusetts General Court banishes Roger Williams, 32, for, among other things, his outspoken advocacy of a separation of church and state. Williams went on to found Rhode Island and the first Baptist church in the American colonies (see issue 41: The American Puritans).

September 13, 1931: Pentecostal preacher Aimee Semple McPherson marries unknown vaudeville performer David Hutton. McPherson's third marriage, it ended in divorce in 1934 (see issue 58: Pentecostalism).

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April 24, 387: On this day, Augustine of Hippo writes in his autobiographical Confessions, "We were baptized and all anxiety for our past life vanished away." The 33-year-old had been a teacher of rhetoric and pagan philosophies at some of the Roman Empire's finest schools, but after great influence by his mother, Monica, and the famous bishop Ambrose, he turned to Christianity. His baptism by Ambrose, on Easter Sunday, marked his entrance into the church (see issue 15: Augustine and ...

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