Francis John McConnell

Francis John McConnell (August 18, 1871 – August 18, 1953) was an American social reformer and a bishop in the Methodist Episcopal Church, elected in 1912.

Born on August 18, 1871, in Trinway, Ohio, he died on August 18, 1953, in Lucasville, Ohio.

McConnell was a graduate of the Ohio Wesleyan University and the Boston University School of Theology. He was an ordained minister in the Methodist Episcopal Church for many years, serving among other places a large church in Brooklyn, New York.

Before election to the episcopacy, McConnell served as the president of DePauw University, Greencastle, Indiana, 1909–1912. During his presidency he led the university's first major fund drive, the Campaign for the Seventy-Fifth Anniversary Fund, which produced a total subscription of $550,546.

Francis John McConnell was a major second-generation advocate of Boston personalism who sought to apply the philosophy to social problems of his time.[1]

McConnell is best known for his quote "We need a type of patriotism that recognizes the virtues of those who are opposed to us".