The Church of Eternal Light (1889)

The Church of Eternal Light is a Pagan Spiritualist church, located at 1199 Hill Street in Bristol. The early history of the building, erected in 1889 is related in Bristol, Connecticut (“in the Olden Time New Cambridge”) which Includes Forestville (1907):

A small Sunday-school was organized in 1884 in the North Chippins Hill district near the Burlington line, by Miss Hattie O. Utter, school teacher in that district. Miss Utter organized the school because the children of her day school were non-attendants of any Sunday-school. She conducted the Sunday-school successfully for a year when her engagement closed and she left the school to return to her home and be married. She was greatly beloved by the people of the district, and only lived about a year after her removal. At her earnest request Mr. William E. Sessions and Mr. B. S. Rideout, who was General Secretary of the Y. M. C. A. in Bristol, continued the school, beginning in June, 1885. The first Sunday only three little girls, sisters, Mary, Sarah and Lizzie Goodsell, were present. Mr. Rideout was only able to continue for a few months. Mr. Sessions conducted the school for four years in the schoolhouse, and has conducted it in the chapel ever since. There was a large and increasing attendance which outgrew the accommodations of the schoolhouse, and in 1889 the Mount Hope Chapel was built by voluntary contributions of the people and friends.

The chapel was dedicated by the Rev. A. C. Eggleston, who had been the pastor of the Prospect Methodist Episcopal Church in Bristol, but was at that time pastor of the First Methodist Episcopal Church in Waterbury.

The school was named Mount Hope by Mr. Rideout, who has been for many years a Congregationalist minister at Norway, Maine.

The building continued for many years as a non-denominational Sunday School and chapel. In 1962, it became the First Michel Spiritualist Church. Twenty years later, it was renamed The Church of Eternal Light, which officially became a Pagan Spiritualist church on February 18th, 2001. A new steeple and bell tower were erected in 2000.

First Congregational Church of Bethel (1866)

The First Congregational Church of Bethel was first organized in 1759. Captain Ebenezer Hickok gave the land for the first meeting house (built in 1760) and burial ground. The original building, located at the intersection of Main, Maple, and Chestnut Streets, burned down in 1842, and a new building (the Second Meeting House) was constructed. In 1865, during a severe thunderstorm and gale force wind, the steeple fell and broke through the building’s roof. The church chose to sell the building (it’s now the home of the Bethel Historical Society) to the town and erect a new meeting house, which still stands today, on the site of the original meeting house, at 46 Main Street.

St. Paul’s Lutheran Church, Wethersfield (1958)

St. Paul’s Lutheran Church in Wethersfield was organized on March 21, 1943 and the congregation initially used a vacant store at 689 Wolcott Hill Road for worship. Outgrowing the store after a few months, the congregation acquired the Griswold House at 371 Wolcott Hill Road. The congregation worshiped in a chapel on the first floor its first pastors also lived in the house. After using the house for fifteen years, a new church building was erected on the property and the congregation began worshiping in its new home on New Years Day, 1958. A parish Education Building was constructed in 1968 and a new Fellowship Hall, connecting the Church and the Education Building, was completed in 1996.

West Street Congregational Church, Danbury (1865)

Danbury‘s Second Congregational Church was organized in 1851, as described in James M. Bailey’s History of Danbury (1896):

A church that should be a church home for people, irrespective of social position or wealth, was a leading motive in the gathering in the basement of the First Church, May 20th, 1851. With no brilliant prospects and no encouragement from the older church, it was voted to try the experiment of a second Congregational church. Mr. Horace Bull was the chairman of that committee, and Henry Lobdell with L. C. Hoyt were appointed to arrange for a preacher and a place of meeting. Mr. William C. Scofield, of Yale Seminary, was engaged to preach for eight Sabbaths, and on June 17th enough encouragement had been received to warrant a vote to formally organize the new church, which organization was recognized by the Fairfield East Convention on July 9th. The church thus instituted numbered twenty-three, of whom twelve were men.

After worshipping in the building of the Universalist Society for four months, meetings were held in the court-room over the Town Hall, but May 6th, 1852, the young church dedicated its own house of worship on Main Street, nearly opposite the present Court House. It was built on leased ground, and after eleven years it was sold to the Roman Catholic Church.

The new church struggled during its earliest years, but eventually a new brick church was dedicated on May 9, 1865. Located at 32 West Street, it became known as the West Street Congregational Church. In 1889, composer Charles Ives, a teenager at the time, became the church’s organist. Today the building is home to Lighthouse Ministries International.

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First Congregational Church of Danbury (1909)

Pioneers from Norwalk first settled Danbury in 1684 and the town’s Congregational Church was first organized in 1696. A meeting house had already been erected on what is now Main Street, a little north of the present Court House. The church currently occupies its fifth meetinghouse, located at 164 Deer Hill Avenue. The building, designed by the architectural firm of Howells & Stokes, was dedicated in 1909. (more…)

Central Christian Church, Danbury (1936)

The origins of Central Christian Church in Danbury go back to 1817, when it established by the Osborne and Wildeman families. It was a founding member of a new denomination, known as the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ), which grew out of the religious revival of the early nineteenth century. It is the denomination‘s only church in Connecticut. As related by Rev. E.J. Teagarden, in a contribution to James M. Bailey’s History of Danbury, Conn. (1896):

During the first two years of the life of the church the meetings were held each Lord’s Day at the home of Mr. [Levi] Osborne, situated on the corner of what are now Osborne and Summit streets, but at that time far outside the borough limits. [. . .] In 1819 Mr. Osborne fitted up a room for church purposes in the loft of his weaver’s shop, in the same yard with his house. This room served as a place of meeting for twenty-one years.

[. . .] It was not until the year 1827 that the brotherhood at large became a distinct religious body, known as the Disciples of Christ, or Christian Church; but not until many years later did the church in Danbury adopt the name Disciples of Christ. During the periods mentioned they were known as Osbornites, after the name of Mr. Osborne, who had been the presiding officer and leading spirit from the first.

In 1840, the church began to worship in a new building. According to Teagarden, “This new building stood directly opposite the present site of the New England Hotel, about where the electric-light tower now stands.” In 1853 occurred

the removal of the congregation from White Street to Liberty Street, near Main, their present location. At a cost of $2000 the society purchased a house and lot from the Methodist church, which had vacated it for larger quarters.

In February of 1934, the church on Liberty Street burned down. Two years later, the current church, located at 71 West Street, was dedicated.

Igreja Adventista do Sétimo Dia (1883)

Built in 1883, the church at 239 Greenwood Avenue in Bethel was St. Mary’s Catholic Church for 109 years. The following excerpts are taken from the History of the Diocese of Hartford (1900), by James H. O’Donnell,

The Rev. M. P. Lawlor was the celebrant of the first Mass said in Bethel. The historic event took place on January 8, 1882, in the Town Hall, in the presence of about 400 persons. In the spring of the same year the congregation secured Fisher’s Hall, in which Mass was said until the church was completed. Before this year the Catholics of Bethel attended Mass at St. Peter’s church, Danbury. [p. 264]

In 1881, it was determined to separate the Catholics of Bethel and Grassy Plain district from the mother church at Danbury. Accordingly, a building committee, comprising Thomas Doran, Michael Brauneis and Owen Murray, was appointed, and the work of securing funds for the erection of a new church was auspiciously and successfully carried on. Sufficient money having been collected to guarantee beginning the work, the construction of the church was entered upon with vigor and enthusiasm. The corner-stone was laid on Sunday, September 17, 1882, by Bishop McMahon. [p.265]

In April, 1883, Bethel was separated from the jurisdiction of Danbury and organized into a separate parish, with the Rev. M. Byrne as the first pastor. Father Byrne died after a successful, though brief, pastorate. The main altar of St. Mary’s church was donated by his mother as a memorial of her son. [p. 264]

The ceremony of dedication took place on Sunday, September 16, 1883, Father Byrne, being pastor. Bishop McMahon officiated. [. . .] The church is a brick edifice, Gothic in style with the tower on the side. It is 49 x 88 feet. The basement wall is granite, and the roof imitation clerestory. All the windows are of beautiful stained glass and bear the names of the donors. The distance from the ground to the top of the cross is 138 feet. The seating capacity of the church is 475. [p.265]

The Rev. Patrick O’Connell succeeded Father Byrne in November, 1883. His period of service was fifteen years. Evidences of his sacerdotal zeal are everywhere visible. The works that signalized his administration were the purchase of the rectory and lot on which it stands, and a cemetery on the line of the Danbury and Norwalk railroad. He furnished the church with a pipe organ and a bell for the tower; erected three sets of granite steps for the entrances of the church; built an expensive property line wall, laid the concrete walks, and graded and beautified the grounds—works which bear testimony to his activity and to the generosity of the parishioners. [p. 264]

In 1992, St. Mary’s moved to a new church on Dodgingtown Road and the building on Greenwood Avenue was sold to the Church of Bethel. It was sold again in 2011 to the Danbury Luso-Brasileira Seventh Day Adventist Church.