Father Damien is a hero in Hawaii for the efforts he made at the former leper colony on Molokai. A Roman Catholic priest from Belgium, Joseph Damien greatly improved the living conditions for the lepers there and ultimately died of leprosy on April 15, 1889. Every state in the US can send two statues from their state to be displayed …

Do you know the name Mitsuo Fuchida? Probably not. Have you heard of “Tora! Tora! Tora!”? My guess is yes. Mitsuo Fuchida was the leader of the Japanese bomber unit that attacked Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941 who gave that famous directive to his fellow pilots. One day after the war he read a pamphlet by American Jake DeShazer …

When the Duke of Devonshire invited George Fredic Handel to perform a benefit concert for charity he most likely had no idea of the impact. First performed on April 13, 1742 at the Fishamble Street Music Hall in Dublin, Ireland (pictured here) Handel wanted it to be easily performed by a smaller orchestra. He had already suffered a stroke when …

Adoniram Judson, along with William Carey and Hudson Taylor, was a true pioneer in the foreign mission field. He spent his time in Burma with his first wife Ann along his side. He died on April 12, 1850 with the distinction of being the first American missionary to Burma and having translated parts of the Bible into the Burmese language. …

The Women’s Union Missionary Society of America for Heathen Lands doesn’t sound like a real catchy title that was created by an advertising focus group but when Sarah Platt Doremus founded it on April 11, 1861 cute titles were not her focus. She and other women were moved by a talk from a missionary to Burma about the plight of …

Johannes Brahms (one of the “Three B’s” with Beethoven and Bach) wrote numerous symphonies and concertos as well as his famous Lullaby. One of his most important pieces was the German Requiem which was first heard in its entirety on April 10, 1868 when it was performed at the cathedral in Bremen, Germany pictured here. He used entire passages from …

When Louisa Lee finished college with a teaching degree in her native state of Washington in 1911, twenty-two years later she had finished her first tour of duty with Presbyterian USA Missions in India. However she disagreed with the leadership when they told her they no longer accepted the authority and inerrancy of Scripture so she left the Presbyterian USA …

One of the mottoes of the Protestant Reformation was Sola Scriptura which is Latin for “only Scripture” which meant the reformers based all doctrine only on the Bible. The counter-reformation undertaken by the Roman Catholic Church had its ecclesiastical beginnings at the Council of Trent in Trento, Italy in 1545 and it lasted several years. On April 8, 1548 the …

Millions have read the B.C. comic strip created by cartoonist Johnny Hart who died on April 7, 2007. While raised in a Christian home, Hart did not take his faith seriously until later in his life and he used the power of his comic strip B.C. and others (like the Wizard of Id) to share his faith. Some protested to …

Many Americans fail to keep in mind that the Pilgrims who landed at Plymouth Rock were fleeing persecution from the Church of England and not the Roman Catholic Church. Henry Barrowe and John Greenwood are good examples of the persecution. Barrowe and Greenwood were leaders in the Puritan movement and they made the case to leaders in the Church of …