July 23, 1373: Saint Bridget (or Birgitta) of Sweden dies. The pious and charitable mystic and founder of the Bridgettine Order, greatly influenced the pope's decision to return to Rome.

July 23, 1583: Protestant printer John Day, who was responsible for publishing Hugh Latimer's sermons, Nicholas Ridley's "Friendly Farewell," and John Foxe's Book of Martyrs, dies.

July 23, 1742: Susannah Wesley, mother of John and Charles, dies. Born the twenty-fifth child in a clergyman's family, she became one of the most notable mothers in church history.

July 24, 1874: Oswald Chambers, author of "My Utmost for His Highest" (which was published posthumously in 1927), is born in Aberdeen, Scotland.

July 24, 1921: C.I. Scofield, editor of the Scofield Reference Bible and defender of dispensational premillennialism, dies in Douglaston, New York.

July 27, 1681: During a bitter battle between Scottish Episcopalians and Presbyterians, five Presbyterian preachers are martyred in Edinburgh. The Church of Scotland became Presbyterian permanently in 1690.

July 28, 1148: Too weak to retake Edessa from the Muslims, the armies of the Second Crusade besiege Damascus. They blundered and were forced to retreat within five days. Believers throughout Christendom were shocked and devastated that a crusade preached by a moral exemplar (Bernard of Clairvaux) and led by royalty (King Louis VII of France and Emperor Conrad III of Germany) would fail.

July 28, 1727: Moody, stiff young preacher Jonathan Edwards marries Sarah Pierrepont, a lively 17-year-old. The union proved happy and produced 11 children, six of who were born on Sundays. This caused a bit of a scandal, because people then believed children were born the same weekday they were conceived. Nonetheless, people admired the marriage, including George Whitefield, who declared, "A sweeter couple I have not seen".

July 29, 1030: Viking king Olaf Haraldsson, patron saint of Norway, dies in the battle of Stiklestad. Though limited in his ability to force his countrymen to convert during his reign, his death was later hailed as a miracle-filled martyrdom and, as his legend grew, it spurred on Christians converting the country. In time, Olaf became one of the most well-known saints of medieval Christendom, and his relics in Norway became one of Europe's most popular pilgrimage destinations.

July 29, 1794: In a converted blacksmith's shop in Philadelphia, former slave Richard Allen assembles a group of black Christians who had faced discrimination in the local Methodist Episcopal Church. They formed the Bethel African Methodist Episcopal Church, the mother church of the African Methodist Episcopal Church, now known throughout the world.

July 29, 1833: English abolitionist William Wilberforce dies a mere three Day s after England abolishes slavery.

July 29, 1968: Pope Paul VI publishes his encyclical "Humanae Vitae," which condemns artificial birth control methods.