John Chrysostom, Preacher

417 Pelagius (ca. 354–ca. 420/440), a British monk, was excommunicated for heresy. He denied original sin and claimed that people could become righteous by the exercise of free will.

537 Byzantine Emperor Justinian (482–565) dedicated the Church of Hagia Sophia (Holy Wisdom) in Constantinople.

1302 On a charge of hostility to the church and corrupt practices, Dante Alighieri (1265–1321) was fined heavily and perpetually excluded from political office (he was a chief magistrate).

1343 Pope Clement VI (1291–1352) issues the Bull Unigenitus to justify the power of the pope and the use of indulgences.

1377 The Papal See was moved back to Rome by Pope Gregory XI (ca. 1336–1378) after having been located in Avignon, France, for seventy-two years.

1593 The Vatican opened a seven-year trial against Giordano Bruno (1548–1600), an Italian philosopher, priest, cosmologist and occultist and an early proponent of the idea of an infinite and homogeneous universe. He was burnt at the stake as a heretic by the Roman Inquisition.

1629 Hieronymus Praetorius, German organist and composer, died (b. 10 August 1560, Hamburg).

1715 Kasper Neumann, hymnist, died in Breslau (b. 14 September 1648, Breslau).

1756 Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, extraordinary Austrian composer, was born at Salzburg (d. 5 December 1791).

1836 Frederick David Schaeffer, Pennsylvania Ministerium pastor, died (b. 15 November 1760, Frankfurt am Main).

1839 John Julian, English hymnist and musicologist, was born in Cornwall, England (d. 22 January 1913).

1839 Lutheran immigrants under August Ludwig Christian Kavel (1798–1860) arrived in Port Adelaide, Australia.

1845 August Crull, hymn translator, was born in Rostock, Germany (d. 17 February 1923, Milwaukee, Wisconsin).

1847 Henry Scott Holland, hymnist, was born in Ledbury, Hereford, England (d. 17 March 1918).

1882 Hans Palladan Smith Schreuder, Norwegian missionary to Africa, died in Untunjambili, Natal, South Africa (b. 1817, Sogndal, Norway).

1948 John Caspar Mattes, Lutheran theologian, writer and hymn translator, died (b. 8 November 1876, Easton, Pennsylvania).

1972 The white and black United Methodist conferences in South Carolina, separated since the Civil War, voted in their respective meetings in Columbia to adopt a plan of union.

1972 Mahalia Jackson (b. 26 October 1912), African American religious vocalist, died.

1984 Leslie F. Weber, former executive secretary of the Missouri Synod Board for Social Ministry Services, died (b. 25 February 1912, Boston). Weber graduated from Concordia Collegiate Institute (Bronxville, New York) in 1931. In 1935 he graduated from Concordia Seminary (Saint Louis) and was ordained in 1938. He was awarded an honorary doctorate in 1969 from the Saint Louis seminary. From 1935 to 1938 Weber was assistant chaplain for Lutheran Service Society of Buffalo, New York. Then he was pastor of the Lutheran Church of Our Savior, Buffalo, from 1938 to 1941. From 1941 to 1964, he was executive chaplain for the Lutheran Mission Society of Maryland, Baltimore. For the next three years he was secretary for chaplaincy services for the synod’s Board of Social Welfare. Beginning in 1967 and until his retirement in 1982 he was executive secretary of that board and its successor boards. While in Baltimore he was executive secretary of the Lutheran Home and Hospital Association (1947–1964) and chairman of the Board of Social Welfare of the Southeastern District (1956–1964). He served as a member of the Lutheran World Relief board in the 1970s and at various times served as a member of the Division of Welfare Services of the Lutheran Council in the USA (LCUSA), consultant to the LCUSA Division of Mission and Ministry and a member of Lutheran Immigration Service of the former National Lutheran Council. Weber edited The Welfare Review from 1967 until 1974 and The Good News, a monthly publication.