For 250th anniversary of Asbury crossing, a tour of America’s historic Methodist churches

By Kit Doyle · October 22, 2021

Religion News Service selected a variety of historic Methodist churches to highlight during the 250th anniversary of Francis Asbury's arrival in America.

Francis Asbury, the “architect of the Methodist church in the States,” would ride nearly 300,000 miles across the country on horseback, preach 16,000 sermons, ordain 4,000 ministers and found what is now the United Methodist Church. Portrait of Francis Asbury in 1813, by John Paradise. Image courtesy of National Portrait Gallery/Creative Commons

John Street United Methodist Church, New York City, New York: Before Francis Asbury set foot in America, Irish Methodists brought the fledgling faith to New York City. They built John Street Church in lower Manhattan in 1768 after Barbara Heck encouraged her cousin Philip Embury, who had been a preacher in Ireland, to preach once again. It remains America's oldest continuous congregation, according to the United Methodist Church General Commission on Archives and History.

John Street United Methodist Church, New York City, New York. Photo by Beyond My Ken/Wikimedia/Creative Commons

Interior of John Street United Methodist Church, New York City, New York. Photo courtesy of LOC/Creative Commons

John Street United Methodist Church, New York City, New York. Photo courtesy of LOC/Creative Commons

John Street United Methodist Church, New York City, New York. Photo by Wally Gobetz/Flickr/Creative Commons

Historic St. George's United Methodist Church, Philadelphia: Historic St. George’s United Methodist Church in Philadelphia received Francis Asbury when he arrived in the United States in 1771. The church is considered the “cradle of American Methodism,” according to its website — not just playing a role in the creation of what is now the United Methodist Church but also the African Methodist Episcopal Church, after Black worshippers left in the wake of segregated worship practices. Its building is America’s oldest United Methodist church in continuous use.

Historic St. George's United Methodist Church, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Photo by Beyond My Ken/Wikimedia/Creative Commons

Interior of Historic St. George’s United Methodist Church in Philadelphia. Photo courtesy of LOC/Creative Commons

The Rev. Mark Salvacion, center, speaks during a service at Historic St. George’s United Methodist Church in Philadelphia. Photo by David Fonda, courtesy of HSG

Lovely Lane United Methodist Church, Baltimore, Maryland: In December 1784, Francis Asbury called all Methodist preachers in the U.S. to Lovely Lane United Methodist Church, built 10 years earlier in Baltimore. At the so-called “Christmas Conference,” they organized the Methodist Episcopal Church, what is now the United Methodist Church.

Lovely Lane United Methodist Church in Baltimore, Maryland. Photo courtesy of Lovely Lane UMC

Interior of Lovely Lane United Methodist Church in Baltimore, Maryland. Photo by Frederic C. Chalfant

People gather at Lovely Lane United Methodist Church in Baltimore, Maryland. Photo courtesy of Lovely Lane UMC

A stained glass window of pastors at Lovely Lane United Methodist Church in Baltimore, beginning with Francis Asbury in 1773. Photo courtesy of Lovely Lane UMC

Old McKendree Chapel, Jackson, Missouri: As Americans moved west, they brought Methodism with them. In 1806, William Williams started a Methodist camp meeting — a “new religious phenomenon on the frontier,” according to GCAH, after moving from Kentucky to Missouri. McKendree Chapel was built 10 years later near what is now Jackson, Missouri, and named after the first American-born Methodist bishop, William McKendree. It is believed to be the oldest Protestant house of worship still standing west of the Mississippi.

Old McKendree Chapel, Jackson, Missouri. Photo by Skye Marthaler/Wikipedia/Creative Commons

Interior of Old McKendree Chapel, Jackson, Missouri. Photo by Skye Marthaler/Wikipedia/Creative Commons

Shiloh United Methodist Church, Shiloh, Illinois: An 1807 revival meeting at Three Springs — now Shiloh, Illinois — birthed what is now Shiloh United Methodist Church. Its original log cabin building was replaced by the steepled church that can be seen today, which is the oldest Methodist church in Illinois.

Shiloh United Methodist Church, Shiloh, Illinois. Photo courtesy of Shiloh UMC

Historical items and documents on display at Shiloh United Methodist Church in Shiloh, Illinois. Photo courtesy of Shiloh UMC

Shiloh United Methodist Church, Shiloh, Illinois. Photo courtesy of Shiloh UMC

First United Methodist Church at Chicago Temple, Chicago: First United Methodist Church at Chicago Temple was founded by what were known as Methodist circuit riders in 1831, six years before the city of Chicago was incorporated. Its original log cabin building was dismantled and floated across the Chicago River to the current site of the church near the city’s iconic Daley Plaza. A larger building was lost during the Great Chicago Fire. It now meets in a historic skyscraper built on the site in 1924 that was dubbed the “Chicago Temple.”

First United Methodist Church at Chicago Temple, left, is located opposite Daley Plaza in downtown Chicago. RNS photo by Emily McFarlan Miller

The Chapel in the Sky at First United Methodist Church at Chicago Temple, Chicago, Illinois. Courtesy photo

The Rev. Myron McCoy preaches at First United Methodist Church at Chicago Temple, Jan. 20, 2019. RNS photo by Emily McFarlan Miller

McMahan Chapel, San Augustine, Texas: When Samuel Doak McMahan moved from Tennessee to Texas in 1831, his new home was part of the San Augustine Municipality of the Mexican Government, where Protestant preaching was illegal. Still, James P. Stevenson, a Methodist preacher on the nearby Sabine Circuit in Louisiana, came to preach at McMahan’s home and organize a camp meeting on his property in what is now San Augustine, Texas. In 1833, Stevenson organized a "religious society" there since it was illegal to organize a church, which later became McMahan Chapel, according to GCAH.

McMahan Chapel, San Augustine, Texas. Courtesy photo

Boeuf Prairie United Methodist Church, Fort Necessity, Louisiana: Circuit riders were active in the Boeuf Prairie area in the early 1800s and formed a congregation there in 1833. By 1837, Boeuf Prairie United Methodist Church had a building in Fort Necessity, Louisiana. By the time the denomination’s Louisiana Conference was organized in 1847, church membership included 141 white Methodists and 100 Black Methodists, underscoring early Methodists’ commitment to racial equality — Richard Allen and Absalom Jones were the first Black Americans licensed to preach in 1784, the year the American denomination was founded.

Boeuf Prairie United Methodist Church, Fort Necessity, Louisiana. Courtesy photo

First United Methodist Church, Salem, Oregon: John Wesley, leader of the revival movement within the Church of England that became Methodism, called Methodists to take the gospel to people everywhere. The Methodist Foreign Mission Society answered by sending a mission to Indigenous peoples in the Pacific Northwest, setting up headquarters in Oregon’s Willamette Valley in 1833. Church services began at the mission in 1835 and moved to nearby Salem, Oregon, in 1841, where First United Methodist Church of Salem was formally organized.

First United Methodist Church, Salem, Oregon. Photo courtesy of SFUMC

Aerial view of First United Methodist Church, left, in Salem, Oregon, between 1902 and 1912. Photo courtesy of University of Washington

First United Methodist Church, Salem, Oregon. Photo courtesy of SFUMC

First United Methodist Church, Salem, Oregon. Image courtesy of SFUMC

Newtown Indian United Methodist Church, Okmulgee, Oklahoma: When the U.S. government began forcibly removing Indigenous peoples west along the Trail of Tears to what it then called “Indian Territory,” Methodists responded by forming the Indian Mission Conference, now the Oklahoma Indian Mission Conference. Among its earliest churches was the Newtown Indian United Methodist Church founded by Samuel Checote, one of the first ordained ministers from the Muskogee Nation.

Newtown Indian United Methodist Church in Okmulgee, Oklahoma, circa 1930. Photo courtesy of Oklahoma City University

Samuel Checote. Image courtesy of Oklahoma City University

A historical photo from Newtown Indian United Methodist Church in Okmulgee, Oklahoma. Photo courtesy of Oklahoma City University