About Us
A worshiping congregation of Union-St. Luke’s Church (Union Church Claremont, and St. Luke’s Church Charlestown). Union Episcopal Church is the oldest Episcopal Church in NH and the second oldest congregation. Union-St. Luke’s as a combined parish worship Sundays at Union Church, while also offering special services at St. Luke’s Church in Charlestown NH. A small, but very active congregation, they are known for their traditional candlelight Christmas Eve Service, Norwegian Meatball Dinners, Gingerbread House Decorating, and other special events. Union Episcopal Church also hosts the West Claremont Center for Music and the Arts, which holds the annual Summer Concert Series at Union Church in the acoustically excellent Colonial building.
Union Church Parish, est in 1771, was incorporated by the New Hampshire legislature in 1794, taking its name from a proposed union between the Episcopalians and Congregationalists of Claremont to support a single minister. Although this union was never achieved, the Rev. Daniel Barber, who became rector of the church in 1795, had been trained as a Congregationalist. In 1818 Barber converted to Roman Catholicism, building a brick chapel and school in 1823 across the road from Union Church. Thus, Union Church has the additional religious significance of representing an attempt at cooperation between the Episcopalians and Congregationalists of western New Hampshire, and of giving birth to the first Roman Catholic church in that area.