337 Constantine the Great, the Roman emperor who first legalized Christianity throughout the empire, died (b. 27 February 272).

1533 The first Augustinian friars arrived in Mexico.

1541 A conference at Regensburg (Ratisbon) between three Catholic and three Protestant theologians attempting to reunite the two churches ended in failure after a month of sessions.

1542 Pope Paul III (1468–1549) called the Council of Trent to deal with the Reformation and renewal in the church.

1560 The scholar John Feckenham (ca. 1515–1584) was taken to the tower of London in England for refusing to take the oath of supremacy. He would spend twenty-four years there.

1563 Malcontents of the ancient Syro-Malabar church of India choose their own bishop, Mar Thomas I, without approval from Rome.

1688 Johann Andreas Quenstedt, Lutheran theologian, died (b. 13 August 1617, Quedlinburg, Germany). [German Wikipedia article]

1690 Johann Jacob Schütz, German lawyer, hymnist and ardent pietist, died in Frankfurt (b. 7 September 1640).

1724 Henriette von Hayn, composer, was born in Idstein, Nassau (d. 27 August 1782).

1789 The first American Presbyterian General Assembly convened in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

1804 Ernst Gerhard Wilhelm Keyl, Saxon immigrant and president of the Eastern District of the Missouri Synod, was born in Leipzig, Germany (d. 4 August 1872).

1851 Edwyn Hoskyns, Anglican bishop and social reformer, was born at Aston-Tirrold, Berkshire. As Bishop of Southwell, England, from 1905 until his death in 1925, he devoted himself to improving labor conditions for the working class.

1868 William R. Newell, pastor and devotional writer, was born in Savannah, Ohio (d. 1 April 1956).

1869 Jonas King, missionary in Syria, Egypt and Greece, died (b. 29 July 1792, Hawley, Massachusetts).

1870 Frederick Herman Knubel, first president of the United Lutheran Church in America, was born in New York City (d. 16 October 1945).

1870 Frederick Arthur Fischer was born in Bad Lausick, Saxony (d. 1937). At the age of 20 he entered the mission seminary at Barmen. After graduating he came to America (1896) and served with the Evangelical Synod of North America in Illinois and Saint Louis. He was received into the Missouri Synod in 1911, and his first call was to Saint John Lutheran Church (Alma, Kansas). In 1921 he joined Concordia Publishing House and also preached at Zion Lutheran Church (Saint Louis) from 1924 to 1936. From 1927 to 1936 he served as radio preacher over radio station KFUO.

1882 Henry Bleby, Wesleyan Methodist missionary to the West Indies, died (b. 16 March 1809).

1883 Billy Sunday (1862–1935), who later became the greatest American tent revivalist after a professional baseball career, had his first at bat for Chicago. He struck out and also struck out thirteen more consecutive times.

1893 Martin Günther, editor, author and educator, died (b. 4 December 1831, Dresden, Saxony).

1894 Berthold Hugo Ergang was born in Lutzk, Russia. He graduated from the Lutheran seminary at Porto Alegre, Brazil, in 1915 and was the first professor at the preparatory school in Crespo, Argentine Republic.

1918 Alexander Merensky, missionary to Transvaal, South Africa, died in Berlin (b. 1837).

1919 The Bolsheviks murdered eight Lutheran pastors in Riga, Latvia, during the Russian Revolution.

1951 Richard C. Neitzel, professor at Concordia Theological Seminary (Springfield, Illinois) and chairman of the LCMS Catechism Committee, died (b. 8 September 1875, Gnevin, Pomerania, Germany).

1966 Cristo Rey Lutheran Church, Guatemala City, was dedicated.

1967 The General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church in the United States (P.C.U.S.) adopted the Confession of 1967.