Religion

Pioneers in Ministry/

When six Ursuline nuns stepped off a train in September 1874, they encountered a smoky industrial town still reeling from a recent economic downturn. Yet, the Ursuline Sisters of Youngstown went on to staff more than a dozen parochial schools, while organizing the city’s first Catholic high school.

Over the next century, they compiled an extraordinary record of community service. When the Mahoning Valley’s fortunes eroded in the wake of deindustrialization, the Ursulines gradually expanded their mission to address a host of new challenges.

Today, the Ursuline Sisters of Youngstown are celebrated for their groundbreaking efforts to assist the urban poor, single mothers and people living with HIV-AIDS. They remain more committed than ever to meeting the needs of the community, in the face of ever-changing social, political, economic and religious circumstances.

Since their arrival in Cleveland in 1874 to serve German Catholic immigrants, the Sisters of Notre Dame (SND) have given their time, skills, and compassion to the people of Northern Ohio and beyond. Beginning as teachers in classrooms from preschool through university, they have brought God’s goodness and care to people in parishes and hospitals, prisons, and the streets as they walk with people who are in need. Members of an international congregation, the sisters responded to the missionary call to serve in California, Virginia, North Carolina, and Florida and in India, Uganda, Nicaragua, and the Philippines. As the Cleveland Notre Dame community prepares to reunite in 2020 with Notre Dame in Toledo, Covington, and Southern California, they look back in gratitude and forward in hope.

As in other cities, Cleveland has developed through the evolution of its European ethnic neighborhoods and their various religions. Many of these neighborhoods built their own churches, which became the focus of community development and unity. For decades, these churches thrived, but the new millennium has brought with it huge changes in the economy. Large "membership" institutions, like the Catholic Church, have had to make the toughest of decisions--closing churches that were thought to be a permanent part of the local landscape. The authors of this book feel it is important to preserve the memory of these significant religious, cultural, and social institutions so that the current and future generations do not forget them. The pictures of these incredible places take on a whole new meaning when coupled with the fact that they will soon be gone. These pages celebrate the architecture, art, and artifacts of these sacred structures in high-quality photographs and explanations.

Stories of Jewish Dayton recovers the lost history of Jewish life in the Miami Valley.

Many stories of Jewish Dayton's past have faded over time. Others, painful to recall, may have been intentionally buried. All are sure to surprise new generations. The Jews of Dayton drank wine during Prohibition, debated Zionism, fought the Klan, and joined the battle for civil rights in the trenches. Balancing tradition and modernity across eras, they navigated the American dream and faced challenges often strikingly similar to those we face today.

Marshall Weiss -- founding editor and publisher of the Dayton Jewish Observer and project director of Miami Valley Jewish Genealogy & History -- reaches back nearly two centuries to unearth forgotten episodes of Jewish history in Ohio's Miami Valley.

Since the last quarter of the 19th century, dozens of religious congregations have made their homes in Cleveland Heights. They have been Presbyterian, United Methodist, Evangelical, Roman Catholic, Jewish (Conservative, Orthodox, and Egalitarian\traditional), Unitarian Universalist, Greek Orthodox, Baptist, Disciples of Christ, Church of Christ, Lutheran, Christian Science, Episcopalian, African Methodist Episcopal, and Congregational and now also include a wide array of community and nondenominational churches. Sponsored by established congregations, encouraged by real estate developers and public officials, and usually welcomed by residents, churches, synagogues, and temples have fostered the suburb's growth, sometimes maintaining and sometimes changing Cleveland Heights neighborhoods. Their houses of worship, ranging from modest renovated storefronts to stately cathedrals, have enriched the city's landscape; their religious pluralism has nurtured ethnic, economic, and racial diversity, as well as controversy and conflict; their calls to action have sometimes aroused the community's conscience. Religious congregations, in short, have helped to sustain the vitality of Cleveland Heights.

Founded in 1805, Union Village began as a religious and communal experiment. Eventually it became one of America's largest and most productive Shaker communities, its members achieving many firsts in education, equality, music, horticulture, and animal husbandry. Their unique faith influenced every aspect of their lives, from making furniture to raising children. They welcomed the leading figures of the period, including Native American chiefs, politicians, and abolitionists, while they continued to open other Shaker settlements in Ohio, Kentucky, Indiana, and Georgia. These vintage images--including many never published before--trace the Shakers" progress as they worked toward creating an earthly paradise. Although Union Village dissolved in 1912, some Shakers remained there for almost another decade. Today Union Village's heritage is still shared with the public at OtterbeinLebanon Retirement Community and in neighboring Lebanon.