NEWS STORY: At the Place of Methodism’s Racial Split, a Time for Reconciliation

c. 2000 Religion News Service PHILADELPHIA _ More than 200 years after racism compelled Richard Allen to leave St. George’s Church, the freed slave returned to the red brick colonial church and received communion from his good friend, Bishop Francis Asbury. Allen left the church in 1787 when white parishioners excluded him and other blacks […]

c. 2000 Religion News Service

PHILADELPHIA _ More than 200 years after racism compelled Richard Allen to leave St. George’s Church, the freed slave returned to the red brick colonial church and received communion from his good friend, Bishop Francis Asbury.

Allen left the church in 1787 when white parishioners excluded him and other blacks from praying at the church. Taking about 50 people with him, Allen went on to found the African Methodist Episcopal Church.


It was Methodism’s first racial schism, and unfortunately not its last. Racism would split the church three more times, and as late as the 1960s, Methodists drew distinctions between black and white members.

That bleak history was the backdrop for Allen’s return to St. George’s on Sunday (July 30) for an emotional service of reconciliation. A member from Allen’s AME church played Allen, while a Pennsylvania pastor portrayed Asbury, the first Methodist bishop in America.

At the service’s dramatic climax, the Rev. Joe DiPaolo, playing Asbury, served communion to Thaddeus Govan Sr. _ the man playing Allen _ from a 215-year-old chalice given to Asbury by Methodism’s founder, John Wesley.

“Back around 1790, there were some unholy distinctions drawn around this altar rail,” DiPaolo said, “but today, this is the Lord’s table, and it is open to all.”

The setting for the service was layered with symbolism. It was from St. George’s that American Methodism flourished. Asbury essentially birthed the U.S. church from the St. George’s pulpit, and the building, dating back to 1763, continues as the oldest continually used Methodist building in the United States.

But two centuries later, Allen’s walkout continues to haunt the United Methodist Church. At its General Conference meeting in May, the 8.4 million-member church donned sackcloth and ashes and begged for forgiveness.

Sunday’s service recounted the exodus, with white United Methodists and black AME members pledging to break down the walls that still exist. Evidence of true reconciliation, they say, will come not in a church but on the gritty streets and neighborhoods of Philadelphia and beyond.


“Our forgiveness comes from God, ultimately, but we need to be doing things with each other that show we are interested in practical signs of reconciliation,” said Bishop Peter Weaver, the United Methodist bishop of Eastern Pennsylvania.

No one is exactly sure what happened in 1787, or if 1787 is even the right date. St. George’s was a growing multiracial church and the heart of the burgeoning Methodist movement in the young country. Blacks and whites worshipped together, although in segregated seating.

Some stories say Allen was forcibly removed from the altar. Others say Allen defiantly walked out when he and other blacks were told to sit in the balcony. And still others say Allen left because the white church leadership would not help him set up a separate congregation for blacks.

Whatever the reason, the Methodists split into largely separate black and white camps. While some church leaders talk openly of reunification, most concede there are too many scars, and they may never heal.

The Rev. Jeffrey Leath, pastor of Mother Bethel AME Church _ the church founded by Allen when he left St. George’s _ said apologies and forgiveness mean little if racism is allowed to continue.

“Our ancestors must give account for their own lives on the day of judgment; we can’t right their wrongs, we can’t make amends, we can’t grant them absolution,” Leath said in a fiery sermon. “The issue is not what walls our parents built, but the walls that we allow to continue.”


Leath said the first step toward true reconciliation is for both sides to acknowledge what racism really is _ a dirty, ugly sin that has stained the church’s call to purity and righteousness.

“Our greatest challenge has always been, and perhaps still is, our inability to see sin as sin and to see ourselves as sinners,” Leath said.

The black churches have cautiously accepted the Methodists’ apology; most say they will wait to see the fruits of repentance before judging the sincerity of the apology.

But for many, the most pressing need is to acknowledge the past but not live in it. To dwell on 200-year-old sins does nothing for either side, they say.

“I can’t hold a grudge, any animosity,” said Mary Brooks, a member of Bethel AME Church. She has forgiven, she said, “as much as I can. But (forgiveness) is not mine to give. And it’s not these people’s faults. They weren’t here 200 years ago.”

DEA END ECKSTROM

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