Guide to the Rachel Henderlite Papers

The Rachel Henderlite Papers, 1851-1993, bulk 1940s-early 1980s, document Rachel Henderlite's life, work, and ministry, including the contributions she made as a teacher, Christian educator, ecumenical worker, and supporter for social justice causes such as the Civil Rights Movement. The collection's forty-eight boxes of material include subject files, teaching files, correspondence, manuscripts, articles, reviews, speeches, sermons, lecture notes, research notes, clippings, audio-visual recordings, photographic materials, scrapbooks, curricula, reports, minutes, books, publications, newsletters, diplomas, and other materials. For information concerning the files of the director of the Covenant Life Curriculum (Rachel Henderlite), see the Related Material section in this guide.

The collection is arranged into eight series: Personal materials, 1910-1993; Yale University Ph.D dissertation and related material, 1851-1958, bulk 1940s; Visiting professor, Kinjo College, Nagoya, Japan, for the PCUS Board of World Missions (1950-1951), 1936-1954, bulk 1950-1951; Ordination to the Gospel Ministry in 1965 by Hanover Presbytery, Presbyterian Church in the U.S., 1959-1976, bulk 1964-1965; Audio-visual recordings and related material, 1965, 1970s, 1982, 1991; Correspondence, engagements, and invitations, 1936, 1944-1988, bulk 1950s-early 1980s; Ecumenism and ecumenical work, 1947-1991, bulk 1960s-early 1980s; and Subject files and teaching files, 1899-1986.

After retiring from Austin Presbyterian Theological Seminary (APTS) in 1972, Henderlite continued to use and maintain her various papers. A sizable number of folders in the collection contain material as originally arranged in reverse chronological order from the latest to the earliest date (e.g., the bulk of the folders in boxes 10-13 of the Correspondence, engagements, and invitations series). During processing the material in a few selected small folders and much of the unfoldered material were arranged chronologically from the earliest to the latest date.

Series I contains assorted material mainly relating to Rachel Henderlite, such as clippings; photographs; honorary degree, award, and tribute files; and diplomas. Of note are two handwritten diaries, from September 7, 1923 to August 8, 1924, documenting daily happenings in the life of a teenaged Rachel Henderlite. A single folder contains a small amount of material from the 1930s to the 1940s documenting Rev. J.H. Henderlite. 

The correspondence and assorted material in two folders of Yale papers provide a brief but informative record of Henderlite's matriculation at Yale, her work toward the Ph.D. degree, and her efforts to have her dissertation on Horace Bushnell's Christian Nurture published (neither the dissertation nor a 1949 revision were published). Primary Yale correspondents include Luther A. Weigle, H. Richard Niebuhr, and Kenneth S. Latourette. Series II also includes typescript carbon copies of Henderlite's dissertation, "The Theological Basis of Horace Bushnell's Christian Nurture," and the 1949 revision, "The Theology of Christian Nurture: A Study of the Theological Implications of Horace Bushnell's Christian Nurture." When Henderlite started working on her dissertation she acquired secondhand copies of Bushnell's works. Sixteen books by Bushnell and two books about the nineteenth-century American Congregational minister and theologian (1802-1876) are included in the series. The bibliographic records for these volumes are in Calvin, the society's online library catalog. Fifteen of the books by Bushnell are annotated by Henderlite.

While teaching at the General Assembly's Training School for Lay Workers (ATS), Henderlite took a year's leave (1950-1951) to serve as a visiting professor at Kinjo College, Nagoya, Japan, for the PCUS Board of World Missions. Three photograph albums and a folder of slides visually document her trip to Japan. Two Japan subject files (1946-1954) include correspondence; issues, clippings, and articles (a few written by Henderlite) from the Presbyterian Outlook; and other assorted material.

Series IV primarily documents Rachel Henderlite's ordination to the Gospel Ministry in 1965 by Hanover Presbytery, Presbyterian Church in the U.S. The scrapbook and folders mainly consist of papers documenting or relating to Henderlite's ordination process and ordination service. Some of the materials included are Hanover Presbytery's candidates examination with Henderlite's handwritten responses, the sermon preached by Henderlite at the winter meeting of Hanover Presbytery on January 25, 1965, news releases, clippings, and congratulatory correspondence.

With the exception of two subject files, the audio-visual recordings and related material in series V have been digitized and are available in Pearl. The series includes three audio recordings: Henderlite's ordination service at All Souls Presbyterian Church, Richmond, Virginia, on May 12, 1965; her interview for the Journal of Presbyterian History on January 24, 1977, in Austin, Texas; and her vision statement for a reunited Presbyterian Church, pre-recorded in Austin, Texas, as a part of the Joint Committee on Reunion's presentation to the 1982 Assemblies on the Plan for Reunion. The two video recordings document the memorial services for Henderlite at the Austin Presbyterian Theological Seminary Chapel, on November 11, 1991, and at Sydnor Chapel, Presbyterian School of Christian Education, on November 15, 1991.

Although the collection's seven other series contain correspondence, Series VI is an informative chronological record of correspondence, engagements, and invitations that further illuminates Henderlite's life, work, and ministry, primarily from the 1950s to the early 1980s. Housed in four boxes, most of the series' folders contain interfiled incoming and outgoing correspondence as originally arranged in reverse chronological order from the latest to the earliest date.

Series VII, Ecumenism and ecumenical work, is housed in eleven boxes and is divided into four subseries: Consultation on Church Union (COCU) and related files, 1957-1987, bulk 1966-early 1980s; Dialogue between the Lutheran World Federation (LWF), World Alliance of Reformed Churches (WARC), and the Roman Catholic Church (RCC) on the Theology of Marriage and the Problems of Mixed Marriages; and related files, 1950s-1980, bulk early to mid-1970s; Other organizations, articles, and addresses, 1947-1983?, 1991, bulk 1960s-1970s; and APTS teaching files on ecumenism, 1954-1979, bulk 1977, 1979.

The first subseries is the largest and documents COCU, a national interracial ecumenical church-union movement of several Protestant denominations, as well as the contributions of Henderlite. Included are COCU meetings; COCU Executive Committee meetings; files concerning COCU committees, subcommittees, commissions, task groups, and the Interim Eucharistic Fellowship (IEF); COCU correspondence; COCU reports, publications, newsletters, articles, news releases; and other subject files. One notable folder of material from 1981 includes letters to Henderlite from her COCU friends that pay tribute to her contributions to COCU and document the high esteem they held for her.

In the 1970s, Henderlite served on a study/dialogue commission composed of representatives from the LWF, WARC, and the Roman Catholic Church that studied the theology of marriage with particular attention to interfaith marriages. As a representative of WARC, she attended the study commission's 1971-1974 meetings in Europe (presenting a paper in 1971), the final 1976 meeting in Venice, and presented a paper at the 1980 evaluation session meeting in Rome. The second subseries primarily consists of study commission meeting files that include correspondence, assorted meeting materials, Henderlite's notes, and presentation papers. In addition to English, files may contain material in French and German (see the Collection Inventory for folder notes).

The third subseries includes files for international and national ecumenical organizations, including the World Council of Churches (WCC) and National Council of Churches (NCC), as well as regional and local ecumenical organizations, including the Texas Conference of Churches and Austin Area Conference of Churches. Addresses delivered by Henderlite include "Toward a Common Priesthood," on the influence of the ecumenical movement on Christian education, and the Dahlberg Ecumenical Lecture, "God's Gift and God's Demand," on the ecumenical movement and a uniting church. 

The APTS teaching files on ecumenism subseries consists of course and workshop material on the ecumenical movement and church union.

Housed in twenty-five boxes, Series VIII, Subject files and teaching files, is the largest series in the collection. Folders are arranged under twenty-four topical headings that were either originally used in labeling Rachel Henderlite's file drawers or created during the processing of the collection:

1. Employment and General Assembly's Training School for Lay Workers (ATS)
2. Special educational experience
3. Professional associations and societies
4. PCUS churches and fellowships
5. Civic, civil rights, and economic and racial justice groups
6. Books published
7. Book reviews, articles, and editorials
8. Sermons, talks, APTS chapel services, and worship files
9. Teaching methods, teaching, and religious education
10. Philosophy of religious education, theology, philosophy of religion, and church history
11. Christian ethics
12. Church and society
13. Counseling
14. New Testament
15. The Bible
16. Old Testament
17. Conferences, meetings, retreats, and other engagements
18. PCUS
19. Austin Presbyterian Theological Seminary (APTS)
20. APTS teaching files and class syllabi
21. Christian education, church education, and curriculum
22. Women in the church and in theology
23. Nature of the church
24. Assorted

A topical heading may consist of a few folders to multiple folders (housed in one to several boxes) with the number of items in a folder ranging from a single item to a large quantity of material. See the Organization and Arrangement section in this guide for a listing of the headings with their box and folder number range.

The sermon/midweek talks/men's Bible class material in twelve folders (numbers 12, 17, and 20 in box 35 and number 13 in box 36 under the New Testament heading, as well as numbers 3-4, 7, 10, 13, 22, 24, and 37 in box 37 under the Old Testament heading) was likely written by Rev. J.H. Henderlite.

The APTS teaching files document the Church's Ministry (CM), Christian Education (CE), and Practical Theology (PT) courses; Interdepartmental Seminars (IDS); and Middler Practicums in Teaching taught by Henderlite either singularly, jointly with a colleague, or as a team member.