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Robert was raised in the Anglican tradition and was received elementary schooling locally. In his teenage years he travelled to Colón, Panama, then to British Honduras, back to Jamaica, and then to the United States. He became a minister in the African Methodist Episcopal Church and left as a [[missionary]] to Germany, and then came to England, where he joined the Church of England and was sent to Sierra Leona to the Church Missionary Society Grammar School at Freetown. He studied Greek, Latin, and other higher-level subjects. Being poor, Robert had to work to support himself, and worked as second master of a public school. He took course in the Church Missionary Society College at Fourah Bay, and was soon appointed a missionary teacher and lay-reader by the Episcopalian [[Bishop]] of Liberia.
After some time, Robert again visited England for private study, and then America to work amongst the African-American community as a lay-reader. He was accepted as a Postulant and as candidate for the Episcopalian [[deacon]]ate. During the waiting period, Robert again returned to England to study at Saint Aiden's Theological College in Birkenhead, but prosecuted his studies at King's College of the University of London. He returned to America, and on [[June 20 on the same year ]], 1895 was [[ordination|ordained]] as [[deacon]] by the Rt . Rev . Leighton Coleman, <ref>The ''New York Times''. ''[http://query.nytimes.com/mem/archive-free/pdf?_r=1&res=9D0DE1DF1639E333A25756C1A9649D946697D6CF Bishop Coleman of Delaware Dies].'' Sunday December 15, 1907. Page 13. (Obituary)</ref> Bishop of the Episcopalian Diocese of Delaware. Robert was appointed honorary curate in St Matthews's Church in Wilminton, and procured a job as a teacher for a few public schools.
In 1898, the deacon Robert was transferred to the Missionary Jurisdiction of Ashville in western North Carolina. By the next year he was listed as being assistant minister at St Stephen's Chapel in Morganton and St Cyprian's Church in Lincolnton. Between 1900 and 1905, Robert moved around much of the Eastern seaboard, serving in Delaware, Charleston (South Carolina), Richmond (Virginia), Nashville (Tennessee), until finally ending up in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
===Return to America and Later Life===
The last mention of Fr. Raphael in Patriarchal records is in the minutes of the Holy Synod of [[November 4]], 1908, which cite a letter from Fr. Raphael recommending an Anglican priest of Philadelphia, named "A.C.V. Cartior", as a candidate for conversion to Orthodoxy and ordination as a priest. According to the letter, Cartior (Cartier?) was also black and desired as an Orthodox priest to undertake missionary work among his fellow blacks. This is the only indication we have of Fr. Raphael's missionary efforts among his people.<ref>Manolis, Paul G. ''Raphael (Robert) Morgan: The First Black Orthodox Priest in America''. '''Theologia: Epistēmonikon Periodikon Ekdidomenon Kata Trimēnian'''. (En Athenais: Vraveion Akadēmias Athēnōn), 1981, vol.52, no.3, pp.470-71.</ref>
In 1909, his wife filed for divorce, on the alleged charges of cruelty and failure to support their children. She left with their son Cyril to Delaware County, where she remarried.
Two years later, Fr . Raphael sailed to Cyprus, presumably to be tonsured a [[monk]]. Interestingly, he was allowed to remain a priest. Possibly somewhere around this time, he founded the ''Order of the Cross of Golgotha''.
Near the end of 1913, Fr . Raphael visited his homeland of Jamaica, staying for several month until sometime the next year. While there, he met a group of Syrians, who were complaining of a lack of Orthodox church on the island. Fr Raphael did his best to contact the Syrian-American diocese of the Russian church, writing to St [[Raphael of Brooklyn]], but as most of their descendants are now communicants in the Episcopal Church, this presumably came to no avail. In December, a Russian warship came to port, and he concelebrated the Divine Liturgy with the sailors, their chaplain, and his new-found Syrians.
The main work of his visit, however, was a lecture circuit that he ran throughout Jamaica. Citing a lack of Orthodox churches, Fr Raphael would speak at churches of various denomination. The topics would usually cover his travels, the Holy Land, and Holy Orthodoxy. At some point, he even made it to his hometown of Chapelton, to whom he remarked of his name change, "I will always be Robert to you".
==Influence==
==="Indirect Conversion of Thousands" Theory===
During the 16th Annual Ancient Christianity and African-American Conference, Matthew Namee presented a 23-minute lecture on the heretofore recently discovered life of Fr Raphael Morgan. He postulates that even if Fr . Raphael's missionary efforts failed outside of his immediate family, he may be indirectly responsible for the conversion of thousands.
Records for St . Paul's Episcopal Church in Richmond, Virgina indicate that for a short while in 1901 Robert J. Morgan was listed as the Rector. However, being only a [[deacon]], this would mean that Robert's position was only temporary, during an interregnum of sorts. The previous [[rector]] was one George Alexander McGuire, an Episcopal priest.
In 1920, George McGuire became an associate of Marcus Garvey and his Black Nationalist movement. In 1921, he was made a bishop of the American Catholic Church by Joseph René Vilatte, and soon after founded the [[w:African Orthodox Church|African Orthodox Church]], a [[non-canonical]] Black Nationalist church, in the Anglican tradition. Today, it is best known for its canonisation of Jazz legend John Coltrane.
George McGuire soon spread his African Orthodox Church throughout the United States, and soon even made a presence on the African continent in such countries as Uganda, Kenya, and Tanzania. However, around the time of the Second World War, the African churches were cut off from the American and in the post-war period had drifted far enough way to request and come under the omophorion of the Church of Alexandria.
Namee questions whence the idea came for McGuire to form namely an ''Orthodox'' church. Fr . Raphael Morgan and George McGuire have a few similarities: both were Black Caribbeans, served concurrently or consecutively at St Philip's in Virginia, were ordained around the same time, and later served in Philadelphia. Namee concludes that with so many coincidences, it is impossible for these two men to not have known one another; and therefore it must be from some influence - either in conversation or evangelism, that McGuire came to know the Orthodox Church.
However, one deterrent from this theory comes in the familiarity he had with the Orthodox Church by McGuire's ''consecrator'', Joseph René Vilatte. At various points, Vilatte come into contact with both the [[Russian_Orthodox_Church|Russian]] and [[Syriac_Orthodox_Church|Syriac]] Orthodox Churches in a move for Catholic-Orthodox reconciliation, having even been accepted for a while by Bishop [[Vladimir (Sokolovsky-Avtonomov) of the Aleutians|Vladimir]] of [[Alaska]] in May of 1891.
* ''[[w:Joseph René Vilatte|Joseph René Vilatte]]'' at Wikipedia.
* Lumsden, Joy, MA (Cantab), PhD (UWI). ''[http://www.joyousjam.com/fatherraphael/index.html Father Raphael].''
* Lumsden, Joy. ''[http://jamaicanhistorymonth2007.moonfruit.com/#/father-raphael/4520858082 Robert Josias Morgan, aka Father Raphael].'' '''Jamaican History Month 2007.''' February 16, 2007.
* Manolis, Paul G. ''Raphael (Robert) Morgan: The First Black Orthodox Priest in America''. '''Theologia: Epistēmonikon Periodikon Ekdidomenon Kata Trimēnian'''. (En Athenais: Vraveion Akadēmias Athēnōn), 1981, vol.52, no.3, pp.464-480. ISSN: 1105-154X
* Mather, Frank Lincoln. ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=RFZ2AAAAMAAJ&source=gbs_navlinks_s Who's who of the Colored Race: A General Biographical Dictionary of Men and Women of African Descent].'' University of Michigan. Gale Research Co., 1915.
