Franklin Clark Fry
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Franklin Clark Fry (August 30, 1900 – June 6, 1968) was a leading American
Lutheran Lutheranism is a major branch of Protestantism that emerged under the work of Martin Luther, the 16th-century German friar and Protestant Reformers, reformer whose efforts to reform the theology and practices of the Catholic Church launched ...
clergyman, known for his work on behalf of interdenominational unity.


Early years

Fry's parents were Franklin Foster Fry and Minnie C. Fry, née McKeown. He was born in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, on August 30, 1900; he had no brothers or sisters. He attended
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in
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; the
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; and the
Lutheran Theological Seminary at Philadelphia The Lutheran Theological Seminary at Philadelphia (LTSP) was one of eight theological seminary, seminaries associated with the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, the largest Lutheranism, Lutheran denomination in Lutherans#North America, No ...
, Pennsylvania. He was ordained in Ithaca on June 10, 1925. Following his ordination, Fry served as pastor for congregations in
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, and
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.


Interdenominational work

In 1944, Fry was elected president of the
United Lutheran Church in America The United Lutheran Church in America (ULCA) was established in 1918 in commemoration of the 400th anniversary of the Protestant Reformation after negotiations among several American Lutheran national synods resulted in the merger of three German-l ...
, one of the larger of many U.S. Lutheran denominations, which had been established in 1918 with the merger of three independent German synods. He expressed a wry ambivalence following his election, claiming that he "would much rather have a pastorate than squirt grease into ecclesiastical machinery". Nonetheless, during his time as president, Fry became known among many church leaders as "Mr. Protestant", a moniker that captured his tireless work on behalf of greater unity among Protestant church bodies and made famous by the cover story on Fry in ''Time'' magazine in 1958. Seeing it as his mission to heal the Christian church's fragmentation into numerous splinter groups, Fry was a prime mover behind the formation of the
Lutheran World Federation The Lutheran World Federation (LWF; ) is a global Communion (religion), communion of national and regional Lutheran denominations headquartered in the Ecumenical Centre in Geneva, Switzerland. The federation was founded in the Swedish city of L ...
in 1947, the
World Council of Churches The World Council of Churches (WCC) is a worldwide Christian inter-church organization founded in 1948 to work for the cause of ecumenism. Its full members today include the Assyrian Church of the East, most jurisdictions of the Eastern Orthodo ...
in 1948, and the
National Council of Churches The National Council of the Churches of Christ in the USA, usually identified as the National Council of Churches (NCC), is a left-wing progressive activist group and the largest ecumenical body in the United States. NCC is an ecumenical partners ...
in 1950. Among his many activities with these groups, Fry presided over the constituting convention of the National Council of Churches, and he headed the policy-making central committee of the World Council of Churches. He described the World Council as a means to "hold Christianity together, to keep the means of communication open, to keep conversation going even if there is no success in our lifetime." Fry also became president of the 72-million-member
Lutheran World Federation The Lutheran World Federation (LWF; ) is a global Communion (religion), communion of national and regional Lutheran denominations headquartered in the Ecumenical Centre in Geneva, Switzerland. The federation was founded in the Swedish city of L ...
in 1957.


Forming the Lutheran Church in America

In the early 1960s, the nation's many independent Lutheran church bodies moved progressively toward greater unity. A number of such bodies merged in 1960, for example, to form the
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. From his position as head of the United Lutheran Church in America, Fry engineered a similar move in 1962, organizing the merger of his own church with three other independent bodies –- the
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, the American Evangelical Lutheran Church, and the
Augustana Evangelical Lutheran Church The Augustana Evangelical Lutheran Church (previously the Augustana Lutheran Synod and also Scandinavian Evangelical Lutheran Augustana Synod in North America and Swedish Evangelical Lutheran Augustana Synod in North America) was a Lutheran church ...
–- to form the
Lutheran Church in America The Lutheran Church in America (LCA) was an American and Canadian Lutheran church body that existed from 1962 to 1987. It was headquartered in New York City and its publishing house was Fortress Press. The LCA's immigrant heritage came mostly fr ...
(LCA), of which he was elected president. Fry was elected as the head of the
Lutheran World Federation The Lutheran World Federation (LWF; ) is a global Communion (religion), communion of national and regional Lutheran denominations headquartered in the Ecumenical Centre in Geneva, Switzerland. The federation was founded in the Swedish city of L ...
in 1957 making him the most powerful figure among U.S. Lutherans, and one of the most influential leaders of world Protestantism. The new LCA cut across traditional ethnic distinctions among Finnish, Danish, German, and Swedish Lutherans, and with 3.3 million members was the largest Lutheran church body in the United States. Theologically, the LCA was most often considered the most
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and
ecumenical Ecumenism ( ; alternatively spelled oecumenism)also called interdenominationalism, or ecumenicalismis the concept and principle that Christians who belong to different Christian denominations should work together to develop closer relationships ...
branch in American Lutheranism. In church governance, the LCA was clerical and centralistic, in contrast to the congregationalist or "low church" strain in American Christianity. His accumulation of jobs was very impressive, serving as chairman of the policy making Central and Executive Committees of the World Council of Churches, and as a member of the Policy and Strategy Committee of the National Council of Churches. At the same time, he was president (since 1944) of the United Lutheran Church in America, a member of the Executive Committee of the
National Lutheran Council The National Lutheran Council (NLC) was a cooperative agency of most of the Lutheran church bodies in the United States. It was established in 1918 and was replaced in 1966 by the Lutheran Council in the United States of America. History The ...
, and the first American ever elected president of the 50-million-member Lutheran World Federation. Fry lived in
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in Westchester,
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, commuting to his offices in
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in the former J.P. Morgan mansion on Madison Avenue in
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. In 1962 he was chosen as "Clergy Churchman of the Year" by the
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. In January 1968, Fry issued a stirring appeal to fellow church members to "unstop your ears" to the need for a "massive improvement in the lot of
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ghettos," warning of the prospects for "spiraling and spreading violence" if racial justice were not achieved swiftly. Fry, as the ''
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'' put it several years after his death, was "known everywhere for his brilliant parliamentarian tactics, his shortcutting of time-consuming wrangles, the pungency with which he cut through intricate debate snarls, and for his wit and incisive dominance of any situation." He was also known as a fan of the
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baseball club.


Death and aftermath

Fry resigned midway through his second four-year term as president of the LCA , only days before his death of cancer, when it became apparent that he had not long to live. The Rev. Dr. Robert J. Marshall, president of the LCA's Illinois Synod, was selected to fill the remainder of Fry's term, and Marshall went on to win the office in his own right in 1970. Fry died of cancer at New Rochelle Hospital on June 6, 1968. His funeral, held at St. Thomas Episcopal Church in
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, was attended by dozens of church leaders from around the world. Fry is buried at
Augustus Lutheran Church Augustus Lutheran Church is a historic church and Lutheran congregation at 717 West Main Street in Trappe, Pennsylvania. Consecrated in 1745, it is the oldest extant Lutheran church building in the United States. It continues to be used by the ...
in
Trappe, Pennsylvania Trappe ( Pennsylvania German: ''Drapp'') is a borough in Montgomery County, Pennsylvania, United States. The population was 3,509 at the 2010 census. Augustus Lutheran Church, built in 1743, is the oldest unchanged Lutheran church building in ...
. His son, Franklin Drewes Fry, followed him into the ministry, was a leading clergyman in the ELCA, and died in 2006 at the age of 78.ELCA news release, Nov. 16, 2006, archived at Worldwide Faith News website
/ref> The Lutheran Church in America, meanwhile, followed Fry's ecumenical blueprint by merging in 1988 with two other Lutheran groups to form the
Evangelical Lutheran Church in America The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) is a mainline Protestant church headquartered in Chicago, Illinois. The ELCA was officially formed on January 1, 1988, by the merging of three Lutheran church bodies. As of December 31, 2023, it ...
, today the largest and most liberal U.S. Lutheran church body.


References


Further reading


Works about Fry

* Robert H. Fischer (ed.), ''Franklin Clark Fry: A Palette for a Portrait'' (Springfield, OH: Lutheran Quarterly, Wittenberg University, 1972).


Works by Fry

* Franklin Clark Fry, ''Mission in South Africa'' (Geneva: World Council of Churches, 1961). * Franklin Clark Fry (ed.), ''Geschichtswirklichkeit und Glaubensbewährung: Festschrift für Friedrich Müller'' (Stuttgart: Evangelisches Verlagswerk, 1967).


External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Fry, Franklin Clark 20th-century American Lutheran clergy Hamilton College (New York) alumni Religious leaders from New Rochelle, New York 1900 births 1968 deaths Lutheran Theological Seminary at Philadelphia alumni Grand Crosses 1st class of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany