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| Image which accompanied referenced article http://www.news-journal.com/features/religion/many-prominent-longview-churches-part-of-first-baptist-church-family/image_59bddd96-b3d2-58ba-b21a-98ba3db9f936.html
I was reminded of
this when I read, Many prominent
Longview churches part of First Baptist Church family tree.
Some congregations are formed from scratch while others evolved as
populations grew, while still others disappeared as the population shifted
(population movement, change in the dominant religions of the area, etc), or
conflicts in religious tenets spurred some new congregations which then subsequently (often decades later) re-joined,
etc.
Some churches are
long lived while others are not so.
Just as we research
state, county and town/city formations, we also need to be aware of church
history and how the presence of congregations has changed through time in the
community we are researching. And, as
reinforced by the article about Longview Baptist churches, it’s important to
know what congregations were possibly formed from a parent church.
For example, you
are researching a family where the parents have lived for decades in a certain
community. You find that they are buried
in the cemetery of a church that was “created” 10 years earlier. Unless they joined the “faith” late in life
(which is possible), odds are that they were members of another church. Sometimes, individuals do change faiths (my
gran in England seemed to join a church of a different faith each time she
moved – what was most important to her were the preachers and how well she
identified with them), though more people probably stick with “one” faith.
Was the church
where they were buried “created” from some parishioners of an “older”
church?
Why is this
important? Just as with government
records, in many cases the records will be associated with the “entity” which
created them. Records of baptisms,
marriages, deaths, and more will be with the church where these events were
recorded in real-time. Yes, these
records might be in an ecclesiastical archive somewhere and again, you still
need to know “which” records to look at.
So, if you find
that a church your ancestor was associated with was not as old as your ancestor,
try and learn its history. This history
might suggest other churches with which your ancestor might have been
associated. This might then lead you to
some neat records. Knowing the religion
of a person and then the history of the churches (of that faith) in an area has
allowed me to work backwards through the person’s life in parallel with
corresponding church records found in the predecessor churches they were
associated with. And, if you are really
lucky, there might also be a mention of “where” they came from and when or of
family members.
Another example is Family Tree of Congregation Beth Hamedresh-Beth Israel.
Have you successfully used the history of a church to identify
predecessor churches relevant to your research?
Are there other family trees of churches that have been created and will
be helpful to researchers?
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