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Welsh Tract Baptist Church is a historic Baptist church on Welsh Tract Road in Newark, New Castle County, Delaware. It was built by Welsh settlers in 1746 and is a simple rectangular brick building with a wood-shingled jerkinhead roof. ==History== The Baptist movement had gained significant ground in England and Wales during the religious turmoil that embroiled the British Isles through the 17th century. Although the Tolerance Act was passed by the English Parliament in 1689 in an attempt to end the religious strife, by the end of that century, new efforts were being made by the English Crown to reinforce the hegemony of the Anglican church over all "Dissenter" groups in the realm. In the spring of 1701, sixteen Baptists, in the counties of Pembroke and Carmarthen, South Wales, resolved to go to America. They formed themselves into a church, with Thomas Griffith, one of their number, as Pastor. They embarked at Milford Haven in June, 1701, arriving in Philadelphia September, 8th, the same year. Local Baptist leaders advised them to join an established congregation nearby along the Pennepeck Creek. The immigrant group settled there for about a year and a half. During that time they kept together as a distinct church, held meetings at each other’s residences, and observed the ordinances of Christ in a manner they had brought with them from Wales. In the two years, twenty-one persons were added to their number. The ceremony of laying on of hands was the principal, if not sole, means of introducing singing, imposition of hands, church covenants, etc., among Welsh Baptists, and they maintained that practice in Pennsylvania. But not without some difficulty, as appears from the following history translated from the Welsh Tract book:
Because of the discomfort created with the other Baptists in Pennypack over the Welsh practice, the Welsh Baptists soon decided to seek a new home. In 1703, they purchased 30,000 acres in New Castle County, Delaware, near what is now known as Newark, Delaware, deeded by William Penn in the 1680s to three Quaker Welshmen: David Evans, William Davis, and William Willis. Known as the Welsh Tract, it included Iron Hill and reached all the way to its northern slopes, now part of Interstate I-95.〔(【引用サイトリンク】title= A Guide to the History and Heritage of Pencader Hundred: Welsh Tract Baptist Church )〕 A small meeting-house was erected on the property, and the community became known as the "Emigrant Church", in part because of the then-unusual practices of laying of hands and singing of psalms.〔 This church stood until it was replaced with a new edifice, built in 1746. Thomas Griffith served as the first pastor of the church until he died on the 25th of July, 1725, aged eighty years.〔(【引用サイトリンク】title= History of the Welsh Tract Baptist Church, Pencander Hundred, New Castle County, Delaware )〕〔Christian, John T., History of the Baptists, Vol. II, P. 121〕 The Church and its practices served as a "mother church" for other Baptist communities established in Delaware and elsewhere, including the London Tract, Duck Creek, Wilmington, Cow Marsh, Mispillion, and Pedee (South Carolina) Baptist churches. Its practices became standard practice for Baptist churches throughout the Middle States.〔''Pa. Hist. Magazine'', Records of Welsh Tract, published by Delaware Historical Society, Issue ix, p. 61.〕 The property was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1973.〔 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア(Wikipedia)』 ■ウィキペディアで「Welsh Tract Baptist Church」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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