PEORIA MAGAZINE October 2023

S P O T L I G H T

‘YOU MUST NOT KNEEL HERE’ From an act of discrimination, the African Methodist Episcopal Church was born, and it made its way to Peoria

BY LINDA SMITH BROWN PHOTO BY RON JOHNSON

T wo black men kneeling in prayer one Sunday morning in 1791 or ‘92 were pulled off their knees by white church officials for genuflecting at the wrong seats. Richard Allen, Absalom Jones and William White, all three free Black men, arrived at St. George’s Method ist Episcopal Church in Philadelphia expecting to sit in their usual seg regated seats against the wall on the main floor. Instead, they were directed to sit in the balcony. Just as the men got to upstairs seats, the elder said “let us pray” and they got on their knees. They had not been kneeling for long when a white trustee pulled at Jones to get off his knees, say ing “you must get up. You must not kneel here.” Jones twice asked the trustee to wait until the prayer was over, but the trustee would not relent, instead sum moning a second trustee who arrived, forcing White from his knees, as well. In his memoir, Allen wrote: “By this time, prayer was over and we all went out of the church in a body and they were no more plagued with us in the church.” Allen and Jones decided that their piety and their dignity demanded that Black worshippers be given the respect due all of God’s children.

Episcopal Church in America. He was ordained as the first Black Episcopal priest in the nation. Allen founded Bethel Church in Phil adelphia as a Methodist congregation. Looking to break away from the Meth odist Church, he called on other Black churches from nearby states to form a new denomination. In 1816, the African Methodist Episcopal (A.M.E.) Church was established. The name is a bit cumbersome, so to break it down, the word Africa in the name refers to the church being organized by people of African descent. Methodist states the faith is doctrinally Methodist. Episcopal means “governed by bishops.” Today the A.M.E. Church is a glob al denomination, with members in 20 Episcopal districts in 39 countries on five continents. The membership is estimated by the World Council of Churches to be 2.5 million. A.M.E. COMES TO PEORIA Ward Chapel is the lone African Methodist Church in the Peoria area, located at 511 Richard Allen Drive, and is believed to be the oldest Black church in the area.

That aggression in church sent Allen and Jones on journeys that put each of them in the history books. Jones led a congregation to become the African Episcopal Church of St. Thomas, which was the first Black Cecilia Jordan is a longtime member of Ward Chapel A.M.E. Church at 511 N. Richard Allen Drive in Peoria

62 OCTOBER 2023 PEORIA MAGAZINE