Public Dialogue: Incorporating Faith: Celebrating the Enduring Legacies of Black Placemaking
Monday, August 21, 2023
6:00 pm - 8:00 pm
Doors open at 5:30 pm
Delaware History Museum and Mitchell Center for African American Heritage
504 N. Market St. Wilmington, DE
Tickets for this event are $10. Delaware Historical Society members receive free admission.
Join the Mitchell Center for African American Heritage for an engaging interdenominational dialogue between current leaders of historic Black institutions established in the late 18th and early 19th centuries by trailblazing Delawareans Richard Allen and Peter Spencer.
Moderated by Dr. Jeanne Nutter, Reverends Dr. Ronald Whitaker of Mother African Union Church, and Dr. Mark Kelly Tyler of Mother Bethel African Methodist Episcopal Church will discuss the connected legacies of the founders of these churches, reveal differences in the growth of their congregations, and celebrate the important roles these institutions continue to play in strengthening Black communities in the Mid-Atlantic and far beyond.
Richard Allen--born in Delaware—and Peter Spencer—who moved to Delaware as a teen—were trailblazers who led their communities in establishing places where African Americans could congregate and practice faith with agency. The establishment of Mother Bethel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Philadelphia and Mother African Union Church in Wilmington afforded African Americans freedom from the limitations and control exerted by the governing bodies and practices of contemporary White-majority Episcopalian and Methodist denominations.
This event is presented by the Jane & Littleton Mitchell Center for African American Heritage at the Delaware Historical Society in partnership with Mother African Union Church and Wilmington Public Library as an educational component of Mother Africa’s 2023 Big August Quarterly religious festival. Begun in 1814 by Peter Spencer, this weeklong celebration of Black religious freedom, freedom of speech, and the right to assembly is the oldest event of its kind in the nation.
A light reception will follow the discussion.