America tends to import its key religious figures. That was the lesson I learned while trying to compile a last week’s list of most influential native-born religious figures .
Many readers grumbled that the arbitrary criteria excluded some of the most important men and women in America’s religious history. They were right. With their help I’ve created a second list of foreign-born leaders who have the most impact on our country religious landscape.
Here is the list of 25 most influential foreign-born religious figures:
1. Abraham Rice - first ordained rabbi to serve in a rabbinical position in the United States
2. Aimee Semple McPherson - founder of the International Church of the Foursquare Gospel
3. Alexis Toth - Russian Orthodox church leader in the American Midwest
4. Alexander Campbell - an early leader in the Second Great Awakening
5. Charles Wesley - co-founder of the Methodist movement
6. Cornelius Van Til - Christian philosopher and apologist
7. Francis Asbury - one of the first two bishops of the Methodist Episcopal Church
8. Frances Xavier Cabrini - first American citizen to be canonized by the Roman Catholic Church
9. George Whitefield - evangelist during the Great Awakening
10. Isaac Backus - Baptist preacher during the era of the American Revolution who campaigned against state-established churches in New England
11. Isaac Mayer Wise - founder of the Union of American Hebrew Congregations and the Hebrew Union College, the first Jewish college in America to train rabbis
12. John Hughes - first Archbishop of the Archdiocese of New York
13. John Murray - founder of the Universalist denomination in the United States
14. John Neumann - first American bishop to be canonized
15. John Wesley - co-founder of the Methodist movement
16. John Winthrop - early Puritan leader, famous for his “City upon a Hill” sermon
17. Joseph Soloveitchik - Talmudic scholar and seminal figure by Modern Orthodox Judaism
18. Junipero Serra - Catalan Franciscan friar who founded the mission chain in present day California
19. Paul Tillich - theologian and Christian existentialist philosopher
20. Peter Maurin - founder of the Catholic Worker Movement
21. Michael Wyschogrod - Jewish theologian associated with the Modern Orthodox movement
22. Roger Williams - first American proponent of religious freedom and the separation of church and state
23. Solomon Schechter - founder and President of the United Synagogue of America
24. Thomas Merton - Trappist monk and social activist
25. William Booth - founder of the Salvation Army
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