Home›Rituals›Tradition›African Methodist Episcopal ChurchDenominationAfrican Methodist Episcopal ChurchChristianityPractitioner SystemVerifiedOrigin 1787 to 1816The African Methodist Episcopal Church is the first fully independent Protestant denomination founded by Black Americans, organized in Philadelphia when Richard Allen and fellow worshippers left St. George's Methodist Episcopal Church over segregated seating. Allen's Bethel congregation, gathered in 1794, became the founding church of a connexional denomination formally constituted in 1816, with Allen consecrated its first bishop. The AME Church spread across the free states before the Civil War and then deep into the postwar South, and it now organizes episcopal districts across the United States, Africa, the Caribbean and Europe, governed by a General Conference that meets every four years.FactsLearn MoreAfrican Methodist Episcopal ChurchConnectionsSourcesEssays About This Entity (1 essay)CommunityComments (0)Reader Challenges (0)FactsBeliefDefining Doctrinal PositionWell-attestedSourced to the subject's own accountTrinitarian: one God in three persons 1Tradition: ChristianityDoctrinal StandardsWell-attestedThe Apostles Creed and the Twenty-Five Articles of Religion, which the church names as the basic foundation of its beliefs. 2Position on Entire SanctificationWell-attestedSourced to the subject's own accountHeld in the Wesleyan sense of perfect love, and carried through the connexion by its own preachers, Jarena Lee and Amanda Berry Smith among them, rather than set out as a separate article of religion. 1Position on SexualityWell-attestedSame-sex sexual relationships are held contrary to teaching; LGBT individuals are welcomed as members but not ordained, and same-sex unions are not blessed 3The Book of Discipline states that unions of any kind between persons of the same sex or gender are contrary to the will of God, and Bishop Richard Franklin Norris' August 2003 statement set out the church's opposition to ordaining an openly gay clergy person. The General Conference vote of 28 August 2024, 896 to 722, retained the ban on clergy performing or blessing a same-sex ceremony after a Sexual Ethics Discernment Committee had recommended repealing it. No source read states the church denies ordinary church membership to a person in a same-sex relationship.Sexuality Position DetailWell-attestedIn August 2003 Bishop Richard Franklin Norris stated the official position of the church is not in favour of ordaining an openly gay person to the clergy. At its July 2004 national convention delegates voted unanimously to bar clergy from performing or blessing any ceremony for a same-sex couple, the first such vote by a predominantly African American denomination, the Reverend Gregory G. Groover Senior explaining that the church's first call is to hear the voice of God in Scripture. The Book of Discipline states plainly that unions of any kind between persons of the same sex or gender are contrary to the will of God. The General Conference vote of 28 August 2024, 896 to 722, retained the ban after a Sexual Ethics Discernment Committee had recommended repealing it, the committee authorised to continue its work toward the next General Conference. 4PracticeLiturgical LanguageWell-attestedSourced to the subject's own accountThe vernacular 1OriginsOrigin PeriodWell-attestedSourced to the subject's own account1787 to 1816 1Place of OriginWell-attestedSourced to the subject's own accountPhiladelphia, Pennsylvania 1FounderWell-attestedSourced to the subject's own accountRichard Allen (1760-1831), with Absalom Jones in the 1787 walkout that led to it 1HistorySeparation or DivergenceWell-attestedSourced to the subject's own accountSt. George's Methodist Episcopal Church, Philadelphia, over segregated seating and worship 1Date of SeparationWell-attestedSourced to the subject's own accountfrom 1787 1ReachAdherents TodayWell-attestedSourced to the subject's own account2,500,000 to 3,500,000 1FinancesInstitutional Wealth or FinancesWell-attestedAt least three federal class-action lawsuits filed by retired African Methodist Episcopal Church pastors alleged that church officials had lost or mismanaged more than 90 million dollars, about 70 percent, of the denomination's pastoral retirement pension fund, which had been valued at about 126 million dollars the previous year. The suits alleged the church's then head of retirement services had sole authority over the fund with little oversight and steered it into undeveloped Florida land, a solar panel promissory note and a since-defunct capital venture. 7Basis of the Wealth FigureWell-attestedCourt-Documented Inventory 7Financial Disclosure RegimeWell-attestedThe African Methodist Episcopal Church does not publish a consolidated denomination-wide financial statement; what reached the public record here came through litigation. A multidistrict class-action settlement announced 30 August 2024 in the United States District Court for the Western District of Tennessee found that a church officer had stolen retirement funds and concealed the diversion of others into unauthorized, risky investments, and began restoring money to about 5,000 affected employees and retirees, with further restoration still subject to court approval. 8Wealth Figure As Of YearWell-attested2024 8IdentityAlso Known AsWell-attestedSourced to the subject's own accountAME Church 1AttributionsChurch FamilyWell-attestedSourced to the subject's own accountMethodist 1OrganisationGovernanceWell-attestedConnexional: congregations bound in a conference with itinerant ministry 1Sourced to the subject's own accountConnexional: bishops oversee episcopal districts and annual conferences, with church law set by a quadrennial General ConferenceEpiscopal TenureWell-attestedSourced to the subject's own accountBishops are elected by the General Conference and assigned to episcopal districts, and retire at the General Conference nearest their seventy-fifth birthday. The Council of Bishops holds general oversight of the church between General Conferences. 1OrdinationWell-attested formerlyOpen to women and men 1 5Sourced to the subject's own accountOrdains women to the itinerant ministryRelation to the StateWell-attestedNo Establishment 6StatusStatus TodayWell-attestedSourced to the subject's own accountLiving tradition, practised today 1TrajectoryMembership Over TimeWell-attestedSourced to the subject's own accountThe Annual Cyclopedia recorded 207,000 African Methodist Episcopal Church members in 1876, up from about 70,000 a decade earlier, as missionaries planted new congregations across the South among the newly emancipated after the Civil War. This is a church-reported membership roll, not an independent count. 1Membership Over TimeWell-attestedThe World Methodist Council's own statistical table, compiled for the 2011 to 2016 reporting period, recorded 2,500,000 African Methodist Episcopal Church members and 3,250,000 people in the wider communion figure, a church-reported count submitted by the denomination itself. 9Membership Figure As OfWell-attestedSourced to the subject's own account1876-01-01 1Membership Figure As OfWell-attested2016-01-01 9Basis of the Membership FigureWell-attestedChurch-Reported Rolls 9Learn MoreFrom Bethel to a Connexion The African Methodist Episcopal Church traces its founding to an act of protest. In November 1787, Richard Allen and Absalom Jones, Black members of St. George's Methodist Episcopal Church in Philadelphia, were interrupted mid-prayer and pulled from their knees by a trustee enforcing segregated seating. Allen and Jones led their congregation out that same year and organized the Free African Society, a mutual-aid body that was not itself a church. Allen's wing of the Society purchased a former blacksmith's shop, hauled it to a lot on Sixth Street, and dedicated it in 1794 as Bethel Church, still Methodist in doctrine and discipline but under Black lay control of its property, a point Allen had to defend in court against the white Methodist Episcopal Church's claims on the building. By 1816, Bethel had been joined by sister Black Methodist congregations in Baltimore, Salem, and Attleborough, all of whom had likewise chafed under white oversight. Delegates from these churches met in Philadelphia that April and voted to unite as a wholly independent denomination, the African Methodist Episcopal Church, the first fully independent Protestant body founded by Black Americans. They elected Allen their first bishop. The new church kept Methodism's connexional structure, itinerant preaching, and Wesleyan doctrine, but placed it entirely under Black leadership, a model that let the AME Church expand rapidly among free Black communities in the North even before the Civil War.Reconstruction Growth and a Global Connexion The Civil War transformed the African Methodist Episcopal Church from a Northern denomination of some 20,000 members into a national one. As Union armies advanced, AME missionaries followed close behind, organizing congregations among the newly freed in Georgia, South Carolina, and across the former Confederacy; membership multiplied several times over within a generation, driven by the church's promise of a fully Black-led Christianity to people who had known only white-controlled worship. Bishop Daniel Alexander Payne, who led the church through much of this expansion, pushed hard for an educated clergy. Wilberforce University in Ohio was founded in 1856 as a joint venture with the white Methodist Episcopal Church; when that venture failed financially, Payne led the AME Church's 1863 purchase of the college for itself, becoming its president, the first African American to lead a college in the United States, and the point at which Wilberforce became the first college owned and operated by African Americans. The church organizes today into episcopal districts, each overseen by a bishop and covering multiple annual conferences, with districts now spanning the United States, West and Southern Africa, the Caribbean, and parts of Europe and South America. Its General Conference, a legislative body of clergy and lay delegates, meets every four years to set church law and elect bishops, and its general officers are headquartered in Nashville, Tennessee. Membership estimates vary by source and counting method, commonly cited in a range of roughly two and a half to three and a half million worldwide, making the AME Church one of the largest historically Black denominations and a member of the World Methodist Council and the World Council of Churches.African Methodist Episcopal ChurchFilter Results11 entriesOrigin Period Start YearAll30 (3)150 (1)200 (1)FrequencyAllDaily (1)Once, or at a turning point in a life (6)Weekly (1)Life Stage MarkedAllDeath and the disposal of the body (1)Entry into the community or the order (3)Marriage (1)Naming of a child (1)Ordination, profession or vows (1)ObligationAllObligatory (4)Undertaken only with authorisation or transmission (1)Scholarly StandingAllA standard analytic category in the study of religion (11)Social FormAllPerformed by a gathered group (3)Performed by an officiant for a recipient (5)Practice StatusAllLiving tradition, practised today (6)PractitionerAllAll adherents of the tradition (1)Clergy or ordained officiants (9)Officiant Led (1)Native To RegionAllAncient Rome (2)Galilee (4)Judea (2)Originated InAllAncient Rome (2)Galilee (4)Judea (2)Originates In LanguageAllKoine Greek (1)Kind of ritualAllBirth and Naming Rites (1)Christian Initiation and Ordination Rites (3)Christian, Jewish and Western Esoteric Devotional Rites (1)General Funerary Practices (1)Marriage Rites (1)Parts of the Eucharistic Liturgy (3)Show ResultsBrowseCompareSelect all 11BaptismAfrican Methodist Episcopal ChurchConfirmationAfrican Methodist Episcopal ChurchFuneral RitesAfrican Methodist Episcopal ChurchHoly OrdersAfrican Methodist Episcopal ChurchInfant Baptism and ChristeningAfrican Methodist Episcopal ChurchMarriage CeremonyAfrican Methodist Episcopal ChurchThe AnaphoraAfrican Methodist Episcopal ChurchThe EpiclesisAfrican Methodist Episcopal ChurchThe FractionAfrican Methodist Episcopal ChurchThe Mass / EucharistAfrican Methodist Episcopal ChurchThe Words of InstitutionAfrican Methodist Episcopal ChurchConnectionsAssociated WithAfrican Methodist Episcopal Church (Wikipedia), Sources Well-attested This source names African Methodist Episcopal Church directly: "community-edited article on the African Methodist Episcopal Church, one of the oldest independent Black Christian denominations in the United States."Source African Methodist Episcopal Church (Wikipedia)Wikipedia contributorstier 3AME Church Facing Multiple Lawsuits, Over $90 Million Missing From AME Pension Funds (Black Enterprise, 2022), Sources Well-attested This source names African Methodist Episcopal Church directly: "class-action lawsuits filed by retired African Methodist Episcopal Church pastors alleged the denomination's pastoral pension fund, valued at about 126 million dollars the previous year, had lost..."Source AME Church Facing Multiple Lawsuits, Over $90 Million Missing From AME Pension Funds (Black Enterprise, 2022)Derek Majortier 2American Civil War, Wars & Conflicts Well-attested The African Methodist Episcopal Church expanded rapidly across the South after 1865 as freedpeople left the white congregations that had seated them in galleries.Source God's Almost Chosen Peoples: A Religious History of the American Civil WarGeorge C. Rabletier 1Rebecca Cox Jackson, Historical Figures Well-attested This source names African Methodist Episcopal Church directly: "initially, an active member of the African Methodist Episcopal Church."Source Encyclopaedia Britannica: Verified Biographies (online academic reference)Encyclopaedia Britannica editorstier 2Richard Allen Founds the African Methodist Episcopal Church, Spread Events Well-attested This source names African Methodist Episcopal Church directly: "a wholly independent denomination, the African Methodist Episcopal Church, decades after the Christmas Conference had organized American Methodism itself at Baltimore in 1784, already recorded here."Source Founding of the African Methodist Episcopal Church (EBSCO Research Starters)tier 2Rift Over Gay Unions Reflects Battle New to Black Churches (The Washington Post), Sources Well-attested This source names African Methodist Episcopal Church directly: "Convention USA Incorporated and the African Methodist Episcopal Church, which forbid clergy from officiating at ceremonies for same-sex couples."Source Rift Over Gay Unions Reflects Battle New to Black Churches (The Washington Post)tier 2South Carolina, States & Territories Well-attested This source names African Methodist Episcopal Church directly: "Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church, founded in Charleston in 1816 and known as Mother Emanuel, is one of the oldest Black congregations in the South and was central to the city's civil..."Source Encyclopaedia Britannica (online academic reference)Encyclopaedia Britannica editorstier 2The Black Church in the African American Experience, Sources Well-attested This source names African Methodist Episcopal Church directly: "denominations of the Black Church: the African Methodist Episcopal Church, the African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church, the Christian Methodist Episcopal Church, the National Baptist Convention..."Source The Black Church in the African American ExperienceC. Eric Lincoln and Lawrence H. Mamiyatier 1Thousands of Church Employees and Retirees Who Lost Retirement Funds to Receive Financial Relief Under Contingent Court Settlement (AARP, 2024), Sources Well-attested This source names African Methodist Episcopal Church directly: "District of Tennessee, in which the African Methodist Episcopal Church and codefendants agreed to begin restoring nearly 90 million dollars in retirement funds to about 5,000 church employees and..."Source Thousands of Church Employees and Retirees Who Lost Retirement Funds to Receive Financial Relief Under Contingent Court Settlement (AARP, 2024)tier 2Belongs To Church FamilyMethodist and Holiness Churches, Groups Well-attested Belongs to TraditionChristianity, Religions Well-attested Branch OfChristianity, Religions Well-attested Contained InHistorically Black Protestant Tradition, Denominations Well-attested Classified as historically Black Protestant tradition per Pew Research Center's 2023-24 Religious Landscape Study.Source Pew Research Center: 2023-24 Religious Landscape StudyPew Research Centertier 1CritiquedSeven Sacraments, Practices Well-attested Critiqued HereKept in the African Methodist Episcopal Church, the first denomination in the United States founded by Black people. The Articles of Religion hold that there are two sacraments ordained of Christ, and that the other five are not to be counted for sacraments of the Gospel.Veneration of icons, Practices Well-attested Critiqued HereKept in the African Methodist Episcopal Church, the first denomination in the United States founded by Black people. The Articles name the worshipping and adoration of images and of relics as a fond thing vainly invented.Veneration of saints and Mary, Practices Well-attested Critiqued HereKept in the African Methodist Episcopal Church, the first denomination in the United States founded by Black people. The Articles name the invocation of saints in the same place, and Methodist prayer is addressed to God alone.Derived FromMethodism, Denominations Well-attested Methodist in doctrine and polity, separated over the treatment of Black worshippers rather than over doctrine.Source African Methodist Episcopal Church (Wikipedia)Wikipedia contributorstier 3Founded ByRichard Allen, Historical Figures Well-attested Led the 1787 walkout from St. George's Methodist Episcopal Church, dedicated Bethel AME in 1794, and formally organized the denomination in 1816, becoming its first bishop.Source Encyclopaedia Britannica: Verified Biographies (online academic reference)Encyclopaedia Britannica editorstier 2Governed By PolityConnexional Polity, Doctrines Well-attested Holds ElementA Collection of Hymns for the Use of the People Called Methodists, Hymns & Liturgical Texts Well-attested The African Methodist Episcopal Church took the Wesleyan repertory with it at its formation and developed it in its own directions.Source The English Hymn: A Critical and Historical StudyJ. R. Watsontier 1Amazing Grace, Hymns & Liturgical Texts Well-attested Sung in the long metre common style, drawn out and lined by the leader, which is a different thing from the hymn as printed.Gospel Music, Sacred Sound Well-attested The ordinary music of worship, with the choir and the instruments answering the preacher.Negro Spirituals, Sacred Sound Well-attested Sung in the independent Black churches from their founding, and Richard Allen's hymnal of 1801 was the first compiled for a Black congregation.Held DifferentlyTemperance, Virtues Well-attested Held DifferentlyThe African Methodist Episcopal Church carries the Methodist Discipline's reading of temperance as abstinence.Source The Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church, 3rd revised editionF. L. Cross and E. A. Livingstone (eds.)tier 1Predestination and free will, Doctrines Well-attested Held DifferentlySource Our Beliefs, The African Methodist Episcopal Church (ame-church.com)African Methodist Episcopal Churchtier 1MembersDaniel Alexander Payne, Historical Figures Well-attested Its sixth bishop, elected 1852, and the principal architect of its move toward a formally educated clergy; led the church's 1863 purchase of Wilberforce University.Source Encyclopaedia Britannica: Verified Biographies (online academic reference)Encyclopaedia Britannica editorstier 2Henry McNeal Turner, Historical Figures Well-attested Consecrated bishop in 1880 and used the office to press the denomination's missionary expansion into Africa, personally traveling to West and Southern Africa as part of his advocacy for Black emigration.Source Encyclopaedia Britannica: Verified Biographies (online academic reference)Encyclopaedia Britannica editorstier 2Jarena Lee, Historical Figures Well-attested The first woman authorized to preach within the African Methodist Episcopal Church, permitted by its founder Bishop Richard Allen in 1819.Source Encyclopaedia Britannica: Verified Biographies (online academic reference)Encyclopaedia Britannica editorstier 2Objects and Practices of This TraditionWatch Night, Holidays & Festivals Well-attested Kept as Freedom's Eve, from the night of December 31 1862 when congregations waited for the Emancipation Proclamation to take effect at midnight, and among the most attended services of the year.Showing 51 to 51 of 51 in Objects and Practices of This Tradition, page 2 of 2.← Previous12Originated InUnited States, Regions Well-attested Source African Methodist Episcopal Church (Wikipedia)Wikipedia contributorstier 3Related ToThe Emancipation Watch Night of 1862, Religious Events Well-attested Uses Liturgical LanguageVernacular Language, Languages Well-attested Sources1. African Methodist Episcopal Church (Wikipedia)tier 3Wikipedia contributors, Wikipedialead paragraphThe African Methodist Episcopal Church, usually called the AME Church or AME, is a Methodist denomination based in the United States.Whole articleOriginated In: United States, LeadThe African Methodist Episcopal Church, usually called the AME Church or AME, is a Methodist denomination based in the United States.View the Source2. Our Beliefs, The African Methodist Episcopal Church (ame-church.com)tier 1African Methodist Episcopal Church, African Methodist Episcopal ChurchOur Beliefs. The Apostles Creed and the Twenty-Five Articles of ReligionView the Source3. AME Church Delegates Name Six New Bishops While Retaining Same-Sex Marriage Ban (Word&Way)tier 2Word&Way, 2024the stated position on sexuality and its supporting detail, the 2024 reaffirmationView the Source4. Stances of Faiths on LGBTQ Plus Issues: African Methodist Episcopal Church (Human Rights Campaign)tier 2Human Rights Campaignthe stated position on sexuality and its supporting detail, the 2003 and 2004 historyView the Source5. Our HERstory (AME Women in Ministry)AME Women in Ministry6. Legal Information Institute, Cornell Law School: First AmendmentLegal Information Institute, Cornell Law SchoolAmendment IQuote, Amendment ICongress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.View the Source7. AME Church Facing Multiple Lawsuits, Over $90 Million Missing From AME Pension Funds (Black Enterprise, 2022)tier 2Derek Major, Black Enterprise, 2022View the Source8. Thousands of Church Employees and Retirees Who Lost Retirement Funds to Receive Financial Relief Under Contingent Court Settlement (AARP, 2024)tier 2AARP, 2024View the Source9. Statistical Informationtier 1World Methodist CouncilView the SourceThe Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church, 3rd revised editiontier 1F. L. Cross and E. A. Livingstone (eds.), Oxford University Press, 2005View the SourceThe English Hymn: A Critical and Historical Studytier 1J. R. Watson, Oxford University Press, 1997Essays About This Entity (1 essay)Eleven Bodies Read Temperance as a Wall, Not a MeasureCarries the Methodist Discipline's reading of temperance as abstinenceRead the EssayCommunity0 members · 7 organizationsVisit This CommunityBrowse OrganizationsOrganizations In This TraditionAfrican Methodist Episcopal Church (Headquarters)Nashville VerifiedBethel AME ChurchBaltimore VerifiedBig Bethel AME ChurchAtlanta VerifiedFirst AME Church of Los AngelesLos Angeles VerifiedMother Bethel African Methodist Episcopal ChurchPhiladelphia VerifiedReid Temple AME ChurchGlenn Dale VerifiedThe Greater Allen A.M.E. Cathedral of New YorkJamaica VerifiedComments (0)No comments yet. Be the first to share a thought.Sign in to join the discussion.Reader Challenges (0)No disputes yet. Spotted an error or a better source? Open the first one.Sign in to dispute this or suggest a correction.View At A Past YearChoose a year to see this entry's facts and connections as the atlas records them at that moment: what it held then, what it held instead, and what it had not yet adopted. Choose Present for the current record.YearPresent200419601787Show This Year