Epworth League
Encyclopedia
The Epworth League is a Methodist young adult association for individuals ages 18-35. It traces back to the founding of the organization by the United Methodist Church's predecessor denomination, the Methodist Episcopal church
, formed in 1889 at Cleveland
, Ohio
, by the combination of five young people's organizations then existing. At its conception, the purpose of the league the promotion of intelligent and vital piety
among the young people of the Church: Members of the Epworth League are known as Epworthians.
.
there were, in 1913, 3846 chapters of the league, with 133,797 members. The headquarters of the Northern League was in Chicago
and its organ was the Epworth Herald. The organ of the Southern branch was the Epworth Era, published monthly at Nashville
, Tenn.
Methodist Episcopal Church
The Methodist Episcopal Church, sometimes referred to as the M.E. Church, was a development of the first expression of Methodism in the United States. It officially began at the Baltimore Christmas Conference in 1784, with Francis Asbury and Thomas Coke as the first bishops. Through a series of...
, formed in 1889 at Cleveland
Cleveland, Ohio
Cleveland is a city in the U.S. state of Ohio and is the county seat of Cuyahoga County, the most populous county in the state. The city is located in northeastern Ohio on the southern shore of Lake Erie, approximately west of the Pennsylvania border...
, Ohio
Ohio
Ohio is a Midwestern state in the United States. The 34th largest state by area in the U.S.,it is the 7th‑most populous with over 11.5 million residents, containing several major American cities and seven metropolitan areas with populations of 500,000 or more.The state's capital is Columbus...
, by the combination of five young people's organizations then existing. At its conception, the purpose of the league the promotion of intelligent and vital piety
Piety
In spiritual terminology, piety is a virtue that can mean religious devotion, spirituality, or a combination of both. A common element in most conceptions of piety is humility.- Etymology :...
among the young people of the Church: Members of the Epworth League are known as Epworthians.
Historical Growth
The League existed in both the Northern and Southern branches of the Methodist Episcopal denomination and also in the Methodist church of CanadaCanada
Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...
.
1913 figures
The membership of the Senior branch in the Methodist Episcopal church North in 1913 was 593,465, and of the junior branch 218,509. In the Methodist Episcopal church SouthMethodist Episcopal Church, South
The Methodist Episcopal Church, South, or Methodist Episcopal Church South, was the so-called "Southern Methodist Church" resulting from the split over the issue of slavery in the Methodist Episcopal Church which had been brewing over several years until it came out into the open at a conference...
there were, in 1913, 3846 chapters of the league, with 133,797 members. The headquarters of the Northern League was in Chicago
Chicago
Chicago is the largest city in the US state of Illinois. With nearly 2.7 million residents, it is the most populous city in the Midwestern United States and the third most populous in the US, after New York City and Los Angeles...
and its organ was the Epworth Herald. The organ of the Southern branch was the Epworth Era, published monthly at Nashville
Nashville, Tennessee
Nashville is the capital of the U.S. state of Tennessee and the county seat of Davidson County. It is located on the Cumberland River in Davidson County, in the north-central part of the state. The city is a center for the health care, publishing, banking and transportation industries, and is home...
, Tenn.
Tennessee
Tennessee is a U.S. state located in the Southeastern United States. It has a population of 6,346,105, making it the nation's 17th-largest state by population, and covers , making it the 36th-largest by total land area...
Modern era
Today, the Epworth League is a global organization that has local church based chapters.Publications
- BaconLeonard Woolsey BaconLeonard Woolsey Bacon was an American clergyman, born in New Haven, Connecticut. He was a social commentator and a prolific author on religious, social, and historical matters...
and Northrup, Young People's Societies (New York, 1900) - The Methodist Year Book
- Dan B. Brummett, Epworth League Methods (New York, 1906)
In popular culture
- In The Music ManThe Music ManThe Music Man is a musical with book, music, and lyrics by Meredith Willson, based on a story by Willson and Franklin Lacey. The plot concerns con man Harold Hill, who poses as a boys' band organizer and leader and sells band instruments and uniforms to naive townsfolk before skipping town with...
, set in 1912 Iowa, teenager Zaneeta Shinn declines a date because "it's Epworth League night". - In All the King's MenAll the King's MenAll the King's Men is a novel by Robert Penn Warren first published in 1946. Its title is drawn from the nursery rhyme Humpty Dumpty. In 1947 Warren won the Pulitzer Prize for All the King's Men....
, by Robert Penn Warren, the protagonist describes the blandness of the column he is hired to write by reference to the Epworth League. - In Against the DayAgainst the DayAgainst the Day is a novel by Thomas Pynchon. The narrative takes place between the 1893 Chicago World's Fair and the time immediately following World War I and features more than a hundred characters spread across the United States, Europe, Mexico, Central Asia, and "one or two places not strictly...
by Thomas PynchonThomas PynchonThomas Ruggles Pynchon, Jr. is an American novelist. For his most praised novel, Gravity's Rainbow, Pynchon received the National Book Award, and is regularly cited as a contender for the Nobel Prize in Literature...
, a saucy secretary tells St. Cosmo, who has entered the office after-hours, that "'this [place] ain't the Epworth League.'" - In Sherwood Anderson's short story/Winesburg, Ohio piece titled "Adventure," the self-stifled heroine Alice, "who could not have understood the growing modern idea of a woman's owning herself and giving and taking for her own ends in life," joins the Winesburg Methodist Church and every "Sunday evening attended a meeting of an organization called The Epworth League."
- In the 1934 W. C. FieldsW. C. FieldsWilliam Claude Dukenfield , better known as W. C. Fields, was an American comedian, actor, juggler and writer...
movie It's a GiftIt's a GiftIt's a Gift is a 1934 comedy film starring W. C. Fields, considered by film historians to be one of Fields' best and funniest films.It concerns the trials and tribulations of a grocery store owner as he battles a shrewish wife, an incompetent assistant, and assorted annoying children, customers,...
, when Amelia Bissonette tells her husband Harold that his Uncle Bean has died, she says, "It seemed he was getting better, but he attended the Epworth League picnic, and he choked to death eating an orange." - In Across the River and Into the TreesAcross the River and Into the TreesAcross the River and Into the Trees is a novel by American writer Ernest Hemingway, published by Charles Scribner's Sons in September 1950. Prior to publication the novel was serialized in Cosmopolitan magazine. The title is derived from the last words of Confederate General Thomas J...
, by Ernest Hemingway, the Colonel describes General Eisenhauer as "strictly the Epworth League."
See also
- Epworth-Euclid United Methodist Church, Cleveland, Ohio
- Waukee United Methodist ChurchWaukee United Methodist ChurchFounded in 1869, the Waukee United Methodist Church is one of the oldest churches in Waukee, Iowa.-History:The church first met in the Des Moines Valley rail depot...
- Hamilton v. Regents of the University of CaliforniaHamilton v. Regents of the University of CaliforniaHamilton v. Regents of the University of California, was a decision of the Supreme Court of the United States that upheld the "right of California to force its university students to take classes in military training" and reiterated that "[i]nstruction in military science is not instruction in the...
External links
- Epworth League: A United Methodist Association for Young Adults
- Epworth League Institute: 2011 Global Conference for the Epworth League
- Epworth League Handbook (2011)
- The Epworth League: its place in Methodism - a manual by Rev. J.B. Robinson, D.D., Ph.D.
- The Efficient Epworthian by Dan B. Brummitt