April 22, 1724: German philosopher Immanuel Kant, a pivotal figure in the history of modern philosophy and theology, is born in Konigsberg, East Prussia.

April 22, 1669: Colonial religious leader Richard Mather (father of Increase, grandfather of Cotton) dies at age 63. He helped author the Bay Psalm Book and the Cambridge Platform, which served for many years as the standard doctrinal statement for New England Congregationalism.

April 22, 1864: The motto "In God We Trust," conceived during the Civil War, first appears on American coinage.

April 23, 1073: Hildebrand is elected pope, taking the name Gregory VII. The first pope to excommunicate a ruler (Henry IV), Gregory was driven out of Rome in 1084. "I have loved righteousness and hated iniquity," were his last words, "therefore I died in exile."

April 23, 1968: The Evangelical United Brethren Church joins with the much larger Methodist Church, forming the United Methodist Church, the largest Methodist group in the world and America's second-largest Protestant denomination (after the Southern Baptist Convention).

April 24, 387: On this day, Augustine of Hippo writes in his autobiographical Confessions, "We were baptized and all anxiety for our past life vanished away." The 33-year-old had been a teacher of rhetoric and pagan philosophies at some of the Roman Empire's finest schools, but after great influence by his mother, Monica, and the famous bishop Ambrose, he turned to Christianity. His baptism by Ambrose, on Easter Sunday , marked his entrance into the church.

April 24, 1944: In "United States v. Ballard," the Supreme Court ruled that no governmental agency can determine "the truth or falsity of the beliefs or doctrines" of anyone-even if the beliefs "may seem incredible, if not preposterous to most people." But the court also reiterated its position that while freedom of belief is absolute, the freedom to act on those beliefs is not.

April 25, 1214: Louis IX, king of France and saint, is born. Leader of the Seventh and Eighth Crusades (he died on the latter), he was known for his humility: he wore hair shirts and visited hospitals-where he emptied the bedpans.

April 25, 1599: Oliver Cromwell, the Puritan lord protector of England, is born near Cambridge. As lord protector he sought to allow more freedom of religion.

April 25, 1887: Radio evangelist Charles E. Fuller, known for his "Old Fashioned Revival Hour" and for cofounding Fuller Seminary in Pasadena, California, is born in Los Angeles.

April 26, 1877: Residents of Minnesota observe a state-wide day of prayer, asking deliverance from a plague of grasshoppers that had ruined thousands of acres of crops. The plague ended during that summer.

April 26, 1992: Worshipers celebrate the first Russian Orthodox Easter in Moscow in 74 years.

April 27, 1775: Moravian minister and missionary Peter Boehler dies. He met John Wesley in 1737 while both were sailing to minister in America, and his assurance of faith and belief in joyous, instantaneous conversion left a permanent mark on Wesley.