The AME Church
The African Methodist Episcopal Church is an offspring of the Methodist Episcopal Church. The word “African” in its name has two connotations. First, its originators were Africans in America. Second, it was used to distinguish this separate organization from its parent body.
The AME church was, at its inception and still, composed largely of people of African descent. But it was never intended to be an exclusive church for black people. It proclaims boldly and attempts to practice the ideas set forth in its motto: “God our Father, Christ our Redeemer, Man our Brother”. Included in that “brotherhood” is all persons, without distinction of race, or skin color.
The origin of the church goes back to an incident, which took place in November, 1787 at the St. George Methodist Church in Philadelphia Pa. On this occasion a number of Africans feeling that they had been mistreated by white Christians, who, during worship service attempted to segregate them to the gallery of the church withdrew in a body from he church. Rev. Richard Allen was the leader, and they set out to form an independent church where one could worship without restriction. This group eventually purchased a blacksmith shop and named it Bethel, it is from this humble beginning that the A.M.E. Church was born.
African
The word African means that the church was organized by people of African decent.
Methodist
The word Methodist means that the church is a member of the Methodist family, which was founded by John Wesley.
Episcopal
The word Episcopal refers to the form of government under which the church operates.
Church
The word Church refers to a community of people who believe in God and have accepted Jesus Christ as the guide and master of their lives.
Mother Bethel African Methodist Episcopal (AME) Church, the first African Methodist Episcopal Church in the nation, was founded in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania in 1794 by Richard Allen, a former slave.
Richard Allen founded Mother Bethel AME after the church he had been attending, St. George’s Methodist Episcopal Church (MEC) in Philadelphia, began segregating its parishioners by race.
The perceived need to segregate white and black parishioners at St. George had its roots, ironically, in the preaching of Richard Allen who had been an itinerant preacher and in 1786 began preaching a 5 a.m. sermon at St. George. Allen’s sermons proved so popular with black Philadelphians that St. George soon became overcrowded. As black attendance at the church increased, however, so too did race prejudice. When the ruling body at St. George decided that blacks should be segregated and seated in a newly constructed balcony, Allen and his followers decided it was time to leave and start a new church.
With financial assistance from individuals such as Dr. Benjamin Rush and President George Washington, Allen purchased a piece of land at 6th and Lombard streets in Philadelphia. He also bought an old blacksmith shop and moved it to the 6th and Lombard location. The Blacksmith Shop Meeting House, as the structure came to be called, was remodeled into a house of worship and dedicated on July 29, 1794. The pastor of St. George, the Reverend John Dickins, suggested that the new church should be called “Bethel” for the gathering of thousands of souls. The church still carries this name today.
Richard Allen and his associate Absalom Jones were the leaders of the black Methodist community in Philadelphia in 1793 when a yellow fever epidemic broke out. Many people, black and white, were dying. Hundreds more fled the city. City officials approached Allen and asked if the black community could help serve as nurses to the suffering and help bury the dead.
Allen and Jones recognized the racism inherent in the request: asking black folks to do the risky, dirty work for whites. But they consented—partly from compassion and partly to show the white community, in one more way, the moral and spiritual equality of blacks.
Preaching in his sleep.
Allen was born into slavery in Philadelphia in 1760. He was converted at age 17 and began preaching on his plantation and at local Methodist churches, preaching whenever he had the chance. “Sometimes, I would awake from my sleep preaching and praying,” he later recalled. His owner, one of Allen’s early converts, was so impressed with him that he allowed Allen to purchase his freedom.
In 1781, Allen began traveling the Methodist preaching circuits in Delaware and surrounding states. “My usual method was, when I would get bare of clothes, to stop traveling and go to work,” he said. “My hands administered to my necessities.” Increasingly, prominent Methodist leaders, like Francis Asbury, made sure Allen had places to preach. In 1786 the former slave returned to Philadelphia and joined St. George’s Methodist Church. His leadership at prayer services attracted dozens of blacks into the church, and with them came increased racial tension.
The Mission of the African Methodist Episcopal Church is to minister to the spiritual, intellectual, physical and emotional, and environmental needs of all people by spreading Christ’s liberating gospel through word and deed.
At every level of the Connection and in every local church, the African Methodist Episcopal Church shall engage in carrying out the spirit of the original Free African Society, out of which the A.M.E. Church evolved: that is, to seek out and save the lost, and serve the needy through a continuing program of (1) preaching the gospel, (2) feeding the hungry, (3) clothing the naked, (4) housing the homeless, (5) cheering the fallen, (6) providing jobs for the jobless, (7) administering to the needs of those in prisons, hospitals, nursing homes, asylums and mental institutions, senior citizens’ homes; caring for sick, the shut-in, the mentally and socially disturbed, and (8) encouraging thrift and economic advancement.
Richard Allen and his associate Absalom Jones were the leaders of the black Methodist community in Philadelphia in 1793 when a yellow fever epidemic broke out. Many people, black and white, were dying. Hundreds more fled the city. City officials approached Allen and asked if the black community could help serve as nurses to the suffering and help bury the dead.
Allen and Jones recognized the racism inherent in the request: asking black folks to do the risky, dirty work for whites. But they consented—partly from compassion and partly to show the white community, in one more way, the moral and spiritual equality of blacks.
By 1786 blacks made up about 10 percent of the Methodist church in the United States, and though whites and blacks often worshiped together, blacks enjoyed no real freedom or equality. Segregated seating was typical; the area reserved for blacks was usually called the “Negro Pew” or the “African Corner.”
St. George’s had no history of segregated seating, at least until the later 1780s. Then white leaders required black parishioners to use the chairs around the walls rather than the pews. During one service in 1787, a group of blacks sat in some new pews that, unbeknownst to them, had been reserved for whites. As these blacks knelt in prayer, a white trustee came over and grabbed Absalom Jones, Allen’s associate, and began pulling on him, saying, “You must get up—you must not kneel here.”
Jones asked him to wait until prayer was over, but the trustee retorted, “No, you must get up now, or I will call for aid and force you away.” But the group finished praying before they got up and walked out.
Allen had for some time thought of establishing an independent black congregation, and this incident pushed him over the edge. Nonetheless, he had no desire to leave Methodism or the local Conference: “I was confident,” he later wrote, “that there was no religious sect or denomination would suit the capacity of the colored people as well as the Methodist; for the plain and simple gospel suits best for any people.” Still he recognized that blacks needed a place they could worship in freedom.
Though Methodist leaders resisted Allen and Jones, threatening them with expulsion from the Methodist Conference (while at the same time pleading for their help during the 1793 epidemic), Allen went ahead and, in 1794, purchased an old frame building, formerly a blacksmith’s shop, and created the Bethel African Methodist Episcopal Church. Bishop Francis Asbury dedicated the building and, in 1799, ordained Allen as a deacon.
For the next 15 years, white Methodist leaders in Philadelphia tried to keep Allen’s congregation and property under its jurisdiction. But on the first day of 1816, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court ruled that the church belonged to Allen and his associates.
Have a question?
If you have a question about how you'd fit into one of our many ministries or need any other Greater Mt Zion Church information, don't hesitate to contact us.