Religious History

787 The Second Nicene Council opened under Pope Hadrian I. Numbered by some as the 7th of the church's 21 ecumenical councils, Nicea II condemned iconoclasm (belief that the veneration of Christian images and relics is idolatry).
1889 In Holland, the Declaration of Utrecht was signed and became the doctrinal basis of the Old Catholic Church. ("Old Catholics" reject clerical celibacy, papal authority and the Council of Trent decisions.) Today in Europe, Old Catholics are active in Holland, Germany and Switzerland.
1956 In Minneapolis-St. Paul, a congregation of worshipers was organized into the first Southern Baptist church to be established in Minnesota.
1977 Rev. John T. Walker was installed as the sixth -- and first African American -- bishop of the Episcopal diocese in Washington, D.C.
1988 The Episcopal Diocese of Massachusetts elected Barbara C. Harris, 58, as a suffragen (assistant) bishop, making her the first woman to be so ordained in the Anglican communion.