Harry Emerson Fosdick - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

Harry Emerson Fosdick was an American clergyman. He was born in Buffalo, New York

Buffalo, New York

Buffalo is the second most populous city in the state of New York, after New York City. Located in Western New York on the eastern shores of Lake Erie and at the head of the Niagara River across from Fort Erie, Ontario, Buffalo is the seat of Erie County and the principal city of the...

. He graduated from Colgate University

Colgate University

Colgate University is a private liberal arts college in Hamilton, New York, USA. The school was founded in 1819 as a Baptist seminary and later became non-denominational. It is named for the Colgate family who greatly contributed to the university's endowment in the 19th century.Colgate has 52...

in 1900, and Union Theological Seminary

Union Theological Seminary in the City of New York

Union Theological Seminary in the City of New York is a preeminent independent graduate school of theology, located in Manhattan between Claremont Avenue and Broadway, 120th to 122nd Streets. The seminary was founded in 1836 under the Presbyterian Church, and is affiliated with nearby Columbia...

in 1904. While attending Colgate University he joined the Delta Upsilon

Delta Upsilon

Delta Upsilon is the sixth oldest international, all-male, college Greek-letter organization, and is the oldest non-secret fraternity in North America...

Fraternity. He was ordained a Baptist

Baptist

Baptists comprise a group of Christian denominations and churches that subscribe to a doctrine that baptism should be performed only for professing believers , and that it must be done by immersion...

minister in 1903 at the Madison Avenue Baptist Church

Madison Avenue Baptist Church

Madison Avenue Baptist Church was first chartered in 1848 as Rose Hill Baptist Sunday School and Church, on East 30th Street between Third and Lexington Avenues. Rose Hill was a house church with twelve members...

at 31st Street. Fosdick was the most prominent liberal

Liberal Christianity

Liberal Christianity, sometimes called liberal theology, is an umbrella term covering diverse, philosophically and biblically informed religious movements and ideas within Christianity from the late 18th century and onward...

Baptist minister of the early 20th Century. Although a Baptist, he was Guest Preacher, at First Presbyterian Church on West Twelfth Street and then at the historic, interdenominational Riverside Church

Riverside Church

The Riverside Church in the City of New York is an interdenominational church in New York City, famous for its elaborate Neo-Gothic architecture—which includes the world's largest tuned carillon bell...

(the congregation moved from the then-named Park Avenue Baptist Church, now the Central Presbyterian Church ) in New York City

New York City

New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...

.

Fosdick became a central figure in the Fundamentalist-Modernist Controversy

Fundamentalist-Modernist Controversy

The Fundamentalist–Modernist Controversy was a religious controversy in the 1920s and 30s within the Presbyterian Church in the United States of America that later created divisions in most American Christian denominations as well. The major American denomination was torn by conflict over the...

within American Protestantism in the 1920s and 1930s.