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This church was originally founded in 1808 by a group of African-Americans and Ethiopians who refused to accept segregation in God's house. This was the first Baptist Church to be non-segregated. It was the most prominent church during and after the Great Migration.
They were the first to move to Harlem, in 1908, under the direction on Pastor Adam Clayton Powell, who at the time, was in his first year of pastoralship. Abyssinian Baptist Church became a social center to African-Americans even after they had settled in Harlem.
The church maintained a home for the elderly as well as housing training schools for religious education, Red Cross Nurses and Youth Bible School. Pastor Powell's church symbolized what he called "the social gospel," a message that urged his followers not to wait for reward in the afterlife, but to work aggressively to improve their own lives and their community's social conditions.
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