A Will to Choose traces the history of African-American Methodism beginning with their emergence in the fledgling American Methodist movement in the 1760s. Responding to Methodism's anti-slavery stance, African-Americans joined the new movement in large numbers and by the end of the eighteenth century, had made up the largest minority in the Methodist church, filling positions of authority as class leaders, exhorters, and preachers. Through the first half of the nineteenth century, African Americans used the resources of the church in their struggle for liberation from slavery and racism in the secular culture.
J. Gordon Melton is the director of the Institute for the Study of American Religion in Santa Barbara, California. He is the author of more than twenty-five books, including the Encyclopedia of American Religions, American Religion: An Illustrated History, Encyclopedia of Protestantism, and the Encyclopedia of African American Religion.
Table of Contents
Chapter 1 Introduction Chapter 2 Anthony's Legacy Chapter 3 African American Methodism's Beginnings Chapter 4 Emerging Centers of Black Methodism: Baltimore, Washington, D.C., and Wilmington Chapter 5 Emerging Centers of Black Methodism: Philadelphia, New York City, and Brooklyn Chapter 6 African Methodism Away from the Cities Chapter 7 The Push into the South Chapter 8 Women—the New Force in Church Life Chapter 9 Toward Emancipation Chapter 10 Emancipation and Its Transitions
What People are Saying About This
Mozella G. Mitchell
J. Gordon Melton has performed a thoroughgoing research effort in probing the records and publications to present an integrative and inclusive picture of Methodism with African American Methodism seen in its realistic roles and functions at the center of the founding and development of this major denomination in American church and social history. He is to be lauded for his persistence in pursuing over several decades the rigorous goal of bringing together the separate strands of Methodists within their true interactive historical perspective.
Robert J. Williams
A Will to Choose gives those who have been unknown to history, prominence; those who have been voiceless, voice; those who have been neglected, attention. In this richly textured narrative, J. Gordon Melton has mined never-used and under-used sources to ensure that the story of African Americans in the first century of American Methodism is fully told and never overlooked again. The inclusion of all the historic African American denominations makes this a critical and welcomed addition to Methodist historiography.
Lewis V. Baldwin
A Will to Choose is the most original and extensive treatment of early African Methodism produced up to this point. Remarkable for its rich information and the breadth and balance of its interpretations, this book is not likely to be surpassed or superseded. Essential reading for historians of religion and the African American experience.
E. Lincoln James
In A Will to Choose, Gordon Melton presents a deeply insightful and well researched chronicle of African American Methodism which he traces from its mid 18th century Moravian roots through the Civil War. He does a masterful job of weaving together the divergent but sometimes intersecting histories of several strands of the Methodist movements as it spread from the North East throughout the South. This book makes a very significant contribution to our understanding of African American religion and spirituality.
Will Gravely
From one of the most productive scholars of American religions, Gordon Melton in A Will to Choose reclaims the lost stories of enslaved and free black men and women who embraced and advanced variant expressions of African-American Methodism from 1770-1870. His narrative sparkles as a moving chronicle of the active and creative presence of these amazing black Christians in the Wesleyan tradition from its very beginnings in North America and functions as a sharp corrective to a scholarship that has more often than not made these African-American Methodists invisible within the largest Protestant movement throughout the 19th century in the US. This book culminates a generation of Melton's devoted research and joins the ever-growing and engaging literature of African-American religious history.
