Azusa Street and the rise of Pentecostalism

At the start of the twentieth century, Holiness Christians in America were praying for a new outpouring of the Holy Spirit. In Topeka, Kansas, in 1901, the preacher Charles Parham taught that “speaking in tongues”, as the apostles did at Pentecost, was the sign of baptism in the Spirit. One of his students, attending from a segregated seat outside the classroom in Houston, was William J. Seymour, a son of formerly enslaved parents in Louisiana.^•

The revival

In 1906 Seymour was invited to preach in Los Angeles. In April, at a house on Bonnie Brae Street, worshippers began speaking in tongues, and the meetings moved to a run-down former church building at 312 Azusa Street. For about three years services ran almost continuously, with shouting, weeping, singing, healing and tongues. What struck observers most was who was there: Black and white, Latino and Asian, men and women worshipping together and sharing leadership, in an age of Jim Crow. One participant famously wrote that “the color line was washed away in the blood”. The Los Angeles press mocked the “weird babel of tongues”.^•

Visitors carried the fire home, and missionaries went out almost at once to Africa, Asia, Latin America and Europe. Racial unity did not last: by the 1910s Pentecostal denominations had largely divided along racial lines, with the mostly Black Church of God in Christ and the mostly white Assemblies of God, founded in 1914.^•

A global movement

Pentecostalism suited places where people already believed in a world of spirits and needed healing and hope. In Brazil, Swedish missionaries founded the Assemblies of God in 1911, now among the largest Protestant churches in Latin America. In Chile, Nigeria, Ghana, Korea and India, local churches developed their own forms, often independent of any Western mission. From the 1960s a “charismatic renewal” brought Pentecostal-style worship into Anglican, Lutheran and even Catholic churches.^•

Pew estimated in 2011 that there were about 279 million Pentecostals and another 305 million charismatics in other churches, together roughly a quarter of all Christians, with the great majority in the global South.^•

Praise and critique

For its followers, Pentecostalism means a God who heals, delivers and empowers ordinary people, including women and the poor, to preach. It has given millions dignity, community and discipline, often helping people leave alcohol, gangs and poverty. Critics, including other Christians, point to the “prosperity gospel” preached by some leaders, which promises wealth in return for faith and donations, to authoritarian pastors and to political alliances in countries like Brazil. Pentecostals themselves debate these questions vigorously.^•

Why it matters today