The Falls Church

Falls Church
U.S. National Register of Historic Places
Virginia Landmarks Register
Location	115 E. Fairfax St., Falls Church, Virginia
Coordinates
Area	0 acres (0 ha)
Built	1767 (1767)
NRHP Reference #	70000870
VLR #	110-0001
Significant dates
Added to NRHP	February 26, 1970
Designated VLR	December 2, 1969

The Falls Church is a historic Episcopal church from which the city of Falls Church, Virginia, near Washington, D. C., takes its name. The parish was established in 1732 and the brick meeting house preserved on site dates to 1769.

History

Colonial beginnings

The forerunner to The Falls Church appears to have been founded by landowner William Gunnell, who had moved from Westmoreland County, Virginia in 1729. In Spring 1730, he secured a minister and convened a congregation, which met in his home until 1733, when the first building was constructed. Until that time, this area was served by clergyman who lived near present-day Quantico, and the nearest church was Occoquan Church near Lorton.

Known as "William Gunnell's Church," this wooden structure was designed and built by Colonel Richard Blackburn, who was directed to construct a weatherboarded building forty feet by twenty-two feet, with a thirteen-foot pitch roof, and with interior work modeled on that of the Pohick/Occoquan Church; cost was 33,500 pounds of tobacco. It served Truro Parish, which was established by the colonial Virginia Assembly in May 1732, divided from a larger Anglican parish centered at Occoquan; Truro's first vestry met in November 1732. Michael Reagan allowed the church to be built on his land, but failed to grant the deed. John Trammell later bought the land and, in 1746, sold the two acre lot, including the church, the church-yard, and a spring, to the Vestry of Truro Parish. By this point, it was known as the Upper Church.

The Vestry Book first referred to it as the "Falls Church" on 28 November 1757, owing to its location at the intersection of the road to the Little Falls of the Potomac River (upstream of the Chain Bridge) and the Middle Turnpike (leading from Alexandria to Leesburg, now Virginia Route 7 or Leesburg Pike, called West Broad Street in downtown Falls Church City).

George Mason was elected vestryman in 1748, as was George Washington in 1762.

The new brick church

By 1762, the wood building had fallen into decay and the vestry (the church governing body) ordered a new brick building to be constructed on the same site. The next year, George Washington and George William Fairfax, as church wardens, assumed responsibility to contract for the new building. After 1765, this church became the seat of the new Fairfax Parish.

The new church was designed by Colonel James Wren, a member of the vestry. Work commenced in 1767 and completed in late fall 1769. The Wren building remains on the site, between S. Washington, E. Broad, and E. Fairfax Streets. The 1769 structure is the oldest remaining church building north of Quantico in Virginia.

Revolutionary War and aftermath

The Fairfax militia recruited from the church during the Revolutionary War, and it is said that at the war's end, the Declaration of Independence was read to citizens from the steps of the south doors. In 1784, the Commonwealth of Virginia revoked the status of the Anglican Church as state church. In 1789, The Falls Church was abandoned and remained unoccupied for almost 50 years when, in 1836, it was reoccupied by an Episcopal congregation. Francis Scott Key was a lay reader of this congregation, as was Henry Fairfax, who used his own funds to restore the building during 1838 and 1839.

Civil War disruption and damage

During the Civil War the church was used by Union troops as a hospital and later as a stable. Worship resumed thereafter, and which has been continuous since about 1873. The interior was repaired after the war, with the Federal government paying for damage caused by Union forces. Some of these repairs can be discerned in brickwork below the windows and in the lower part of the brick doorway at the west end of the church.

The church was remodeled in 1908 and extensively renovated in 1959. Galleries, in Wren's original design but never constructed, were installed and a new chancel was added. Other than repairs of war damage and the chancel addition, the structure reflects the original 1769 construction.

Legal issues

In recent years the congregation became divided on religious issues and the buildings and property of the congregation became the subject of protracted litigation.

In December 2006, the congregation by a vote of 1221 to 127 voted to disaffiliate from the Episcopal Church in the United States of America (ECUSA) (a member of the Anglican Communion), and join the Convocation of Anglicans in North America (CANA), originally a missionary initiative of the Anglican Church of Nigeria, and now a member jurisdiction of the Anglican Church in North America, which is not part of the Anglican Communion, but is affiliated with the Fellowship of Confessing Anglicans, a network of conservative Anglican churches which formed in 2008 in response to an ongoing theological crisis in the worldwide Anglican Communion. The disaffiliating portion of the congregation became known as The Falls Church (Anglican) continued to worship at The Falls Church property. Members remaining loyal to the Episcopal Church in the United States of America (ECUSA), now known as The Falls Church (Episcopal), worshiped across the street at Falls Church Presbyterian Church. Litigation ensued, and in 2012 a court in Fairfax, Virginia held that the Diocese and ECUSA have “a contractual and proprietary interest” in The Falls Church and other properties and ordered return of the properties to the Diocese. The Episcopal parish thus returned to worshiping at the historic property, and the Anglican parish moved to a different location.

In mid to late December 2006, the portion of the congregation that had voted to disaffiliate from The Episcopal Church petitioned the local circuit court to transfer ownership of the property to CANA. The Diocese of Virginia and the Protestant Episcopal Church of the United States of America (ECUSA) intervened in the case and resisted the transfer. In December 2008, the court ruled in favor of CANA with respect to all property with the exception of an endowment fund. The Diocese of Virginia and the Protestant Episcopal Church appealed to the Supreme Court of Virginia, which a number of other hierarchical churches joined as amici curiae, including the Episcopal dioceses of Southern Virginia and Southwestern Virginia, along with representatives of consultative bodies from the United Methodist Church, the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), The African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church, The African Methodist Episcopal Church, the National Capital Presbytery, Presbytery of Eastern Virginia, and the Metro DC Synod of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America. The Virginia Supreme Court ruled in favor of the Episcopal Church and the Diocese of Virginia, finding that the Falls Church and the other breakaway parishes did not meet the criteria of the statute under which the trial court awarded them control of the real property. The case was remanded to the trial court for further proceedings.

Thereafter, in January 2012, the trial court ruled in favor of the Diocese and ECUSA. The Falls Church and the other CANA parishes appealed the court's ruling to the Virginia Supreme Court, which affirmed the decision leaving the church property in the hands of The Episcopal Church. By Easter, April 8, 2012, The Episcopal Diocese of Virginia was in the process of retaking ownership of the parish property of The Falls Church, and the continuing Episcopal congregation of The Falls Church began worshiping again on the parish campus after worshiping in the hall of a Presbyterian church across the street for over five years. On March 10, 2014, The U.S. Supreme Court declined to hear an appeal by the Falls Church Anglican, ending the matter.

External links

• Falls Church (Episcopal), 115 East Fairfax Street, Falls Church, Falls Church, VA at the Historic American Buildings Survey (HABS)

The Falls Church (Episcopal)

• The Falls Church (Episcopal)
• The Episcopal Diocese of Virginia
• The Archbishop of Canterbury (head of Anglican Communion)

The Falls Church (Anglican)

• The Falls Church Anglican (CANA)
• The Church of Nigeria (member of Anglican Communion, though sponsor of and/or aligned with non-member bodies below)
• The Anglican District of Virginia (CANA)
• The Convocation of Anglicans in North America (CANA)