Saint of the Week: William White
7/16/2026
William White
1747 - 1836
Bishop
From Lesser Feasts and Fasts:
William White was born in Philadelphia on March 24, 1747, and was educated at the college of that city, graduating in 1765. In 1770 he went to England, where he was ordained as a deacon on December 23, and as a priest on April 25, 1772.
Upon his return home, he became assistant minister of Christ and St. Peter’s from 1772 to 1779, and rector from that year until his death on July 17, 1836. He also served as chaplain of the Continental Congress from 1777 to 1789, and then of the United States Senate until 1800. Chosen unanimously as first Bishop of Pennsylvania in 1786, he went to England again, with Samuel Provoost, Bishop-elect of New York; and the two men were consecrated in Lambeth Chapel on Septuagesima Sunday, February 4, 1787, by the Archbishops of Canterbury and York and the Bishops of Bath and Wells and of Peterborough.
Bishop White was the chief architect of the Constitution of the American Episcopal Church and the overseer of its life during the first generation of its history. He was the Presiding Bishop at its organizing General Convention in 1789, and again from 1795 until his death in Philadelphia on July 17, 1836.
He was a theologian of significant ability, and among his protégés, in whose formation he had a large hand, were many leaders of a new generation such as John Henry Hobart, Jackson Kemper, and William Augustus Muhlenberg. White’s gifts of statesmanship and reconciling moderation steered the American Church through the first decades of its independent life.
O Lord, who in a time of turmoil and confusion raised up your servant William White to lead your church into ways of stability and peace; Hear our prayer, and give us wise and faithful leaders, that, through their ministry, your people may be blessed and your will be done; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.
