UCCFirsts

The United Church of Christ is a blend of many traditions—some ancient, others very
new. We are a church open to both the past and the future. Four of our oldest
traditions—Congregational, Christian, Evangelical, and Reformed—have left a mark on
U.S. history and culture. Join us in this brief historical survey.

1620: Pilgrims seek spiritual freedom

Seeking spiritual freedom, forebears of the United Church of Christ prepare to leave
Europe for the New World. Later generations know them as the Pilgrims. Their pastor,
John Robinson, urges them as they depart to keep their minds and hearts open to new
ways. God, he says, "hath yet more truth and light to break forth out of his holy Word."

1630: An early experiment in democracy

The Congregational churches founded by the Pilgrims and other reformers spread
rapidly through New England. In an early experiment in democracy, each congregation is
self-governing and elects its own ministers. The Congregationalists aim to create a
model for a just society lived in the presence of God. Their leader, John Winthrop, prays
that "we shall be as a city upon a hill ... the eyes of all people upon us."

1700: An early stand against slavery

Congregationalists are among the first Americans to take a stand against slavery. The
Rev. Samuel Sewall writes the first anti-slavery pamphlet in America, "The Selling of
Joseph." Sewall lays the foundation for the abolitionist movement that comes more than
a century later.

1730s: The Great Awakening

The first Great Awakening sweeps through Congregational and Presbyterian churches.
One of the great thinkers of the movement, Jonathan Edwards, says the church should
recover the passion of a transforming faith that changes "the course of [our] lives."

1773: First act of civil disobedience

Five thousand angry colonists gather in the Old South Meeting House to demand repeal
of an unjust tax on tea. Their protest inspires the first act of civil disobedience in U.S.
history—the "Boston Tea Party."

1773: First published African American poet

A young member of the Old South congregation, Phillis Wheatley, becomes the first
published African American author. "Poems on Various Subjects" is a sensation, and
Wheatley gains her freedom from slavery soon after. Modern African American poet
Alice Walker says of her: "[She] kept alive, in so many of our ancestors, the notion of
song."

1777: Reformed congregation saves the Liberty Bell

The British occupy Philadelphia—seat of the rebellious Continental Congress. But the
Liberty Bell—a symbol of American independence—has disappeared. It is safely hidden
under the floorboards of Old Zion Reformed Church in Allentown, Pennsylvania.

1785: First ordained African American pastor

Lemuel Haynes is the first African American ordained by a Protestant denomination. In
1776, in the midst of the fight for liberty in which he enlists as a soldier, he writes a
defense of the liberation of African Americans from slavery: "Liberty, Further Extended."
He becomes a world-renowned preacher and writer.

1798: 'Christians' seek liberty of conscience

Dissident preacher James O'Kelly is one of the early founders of a religious movement
called simply the "Christians." His aim is to restore the simplicity of the original Christian
community. The Christians seek liberty of conscience and oppose authoritarian church
government. O'Kelly writes that "any number of Christians united in love, having Christ
for their head, ... constitutes a church."

1817: First school for the deaf

Thomas Hopkins Gallaudet introduces sign language to North America and co-founds
the American School for the Deaf in Hartford, Connecticut. It's the beginning of a
movement that will transform the lives of millions of hearing-impaired persons.

1839: A defining moment for the abolitionist movement

Enslaved Africans break their chains and seize control of the schooner Amistad. Their
freedom is short-lived, and they are held in a Connecticut jail while the ship's owners sue
to have them returned as property. The case becomes a defining moment for the
movement to abolish slavery. Congregationalists and other Christians organize a
campaign to free the captives. The Supreme Court rules the captives are not property,
and the Africans regain their freedom.

1840: First united church in U.S. history

A meeting of pastors in Missouri forms the first united church in U.S. history—the
Evangelical Synod. It embraces two Protestant traditions that have been separated for
centuries: Lutheran and Reformed. The Evangelicals believe in the power of tradition,
but also in spiritual freedom. "Rigid ceremony and strong condemnation of others are
terrible things to me," one of them writes.

1845: 'Protestant Catholicism'

Theologian Philip Schaff scandalizes the Reformed churches in Pennsylvania when he
argues for a "Protestant Catholicism" centered in the person of Jesus Christ. The
movement founded by Schaff and his friend, John Nevin, revives sacramental worship
and sets the stage for the rediscovery of ancient spiritual traditions in many Protestant
churches a century later.

1846: First integrated anti-slavery society

The Amistad case is a spur to the conscience of Congregationalists and other Christians
who believe no human being should be a slave. In 1846 Lewis Tappan, one of the
Amistad organizers, organizes the American Missionary Association—the first anti-
slavery society in the U.S. with multiracial leadership.

1853: First woman pastor

Antoinette Brown is the first woman since New Testament times ordained as a Christian
minister, and perhaps the first woman in history elected to serve a Christian
congregation as pastor. At her ordination a friend, Methodist minister Luther Lee,
defends "a woman's right to preach the Gospel." He quotes the New Testament: "There
is neither male nor female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus."

1897: Social Gospel movement denounces economic oppression

Congregationalist Washington Gladden is one of the first leaders of the Social Gospel
movement—which takes literally the commandment of Jesus to "love your neighbor as
yourself." Social Gospel preachers denounce injustice and the exploitation of the poor.
He writes a hymn that summarizes his creed: "[God,] light up your Word: the fettered
page from killing bondage free."

1943: The 'Serenity Prayer'

Evangelical and Reformed theologian Reinhold Niebuhr preaches a sermon that
introduces the world to the now famous Serenity Prayer: "God, give us grace to accept
with serenity the things that cannot be changed, courage to change the things that
should be changed, and the wisdom to distinguish the one from the other."

1952: 'The Courage to Be'

Evangelical and Reformed theologian Paul Tillich publishes "The Courage to Be"—later
named by the New York Public Library as one of the "Books of the Century." "Life
demands again and again," he writes, "the courage to surrender some or even all
security for the sake of full self-affirmation."

1957: Spiritual and ethnic traditions unite

The United Church of Christ is born when the Evangelical and Reformed Church unites
with the Congregational Christian Churches. The new community embraces a rich
variety of spiritual traditions and welcomes believers of African, Asian, Pacific, Latin
American, Native American and European descent.

1959: Historic ruling that airwaves are public property

Southern television stations impose a news blackout on the growing civil rights
movement, and Martin Luther King Jr. asks the UCC to intervene. Everett Parker of the
UCC’s Office of Communication organizes churches and wins in Federal court a ruling
that the airwaves are public, not private property. The decision leads to a proliferation of
people of color in television studios and newsrooms.

1972: Ordination of first openly gay minister

The UCC's Golden Gate Association ordains the first openly gay person as a minister in
an historic Protestant denomination: the Rev. William R. Johnson. In the following three
decades, the UCC's General Synod urges equal rights for homosexual citizens and calls
on congregations to welcome gay, lesbian and bisexual members. In 2005 General
Synod goes one step further: it becomes the first leadership body of a large U.S. church
to support equal marriage rights for same-sex couples.

1973: Civil rights activists freed

The Wilmington Ten—ten civil rights activists—are charged with the arson of a white-
owned grocery store in Wilmington, N.C. One of them is Benjamin Chavis, a UCC
missionary and community organizer. Convinced the charges are false, the UCC's
General Synod raises more than $1 million to pay for bail. Chavis spends four and a half
years in prison but is freed when his conviction is overturned. The UCC recovers its
bail—with interest.

1976: First African American leader of an integrated denomination

General Synod elects the Rev. Joseph H. Evans president of the United Church of
Christ. He becomes the first African American leader of a racially integrated mainline
church in the United States.

1995: Singing a new song

The United Church of Christ publishes The New Century Hymnal—the only hymnbook
released by a Christian church that honors in equal measure both male and female
images of God. Although its poetry is contemporary, its theology is traditional. "We
acknowledge the limitations of our words while we confess that in Jesus Christ the Word
of God became flesh and lived within history," writes Thomas Dipko, a UCC executive
who played a key role in shaping the new hymnal.

Being first often means standing with others. None of these "firsts" in UCC history would
have been possible without the help of friends and partners: Congregationalists shared
leadership in the anti-slavery movement with Christians from many traditions; the
Disciples of Christ and other Christian churches are also heirs to the movement for
spiritual liberty founded by reformers like James O'Kelly; Antoinette Brown was ordained
a Congregationalist minister but later found a welcome in Unitarian churches. We are
proud to share these accomplishments with many people of faith across denominational
boundaries.