St. James Celebrates 129 years of Ministry in the City of New York

On Sunday, April 28, 2024, St. James Presbyterian Church in the Village of Harlem Celebrates 129 years of ministry as a historic African American Congregation in the Presbytery of New York City. Our ministry was built on our Mother Congregation, Shiloh Presbyterian Church, the first African American Presbyterian Church in the City of New York, founded in 1822 by Rev. Samuel Cornish. It was established as an abolitionist congregation and was pastored by such noted persons as Rev. Theodore Sedgwick Wright-the first African American graduate of Princeton Theological Seminary; Rev. Henry Highland Garnet-famed abolitionist, the first African American minister to speak to Congress after the Civil War, and diplomat.

​We honor the founding of St. James by the Rev. Pierce Butler Thomkins, who, with a remnant of Shiloh upon his graduation from Union Theological Seminary in the City of New York, lobbied the Presbytery of New York City for three years for the re-establishment of an African American Presbyterian Church in Manhattan. St. James celebrates its ancestors and their contributions to education, such as supporting the Lucy Laney Craft Schools. We treasure our annual ecumenical Thanksgiving Day Worship Service, in place since 1905, in protest of the dishonorable discharge of the African American soldiers in Brownsville, TX. We lift up the powerful ministry of the Rev. William Lloyd Imes, the first African American to serve on the board of a Seminary, his alma mater, Union Theological Seminary in the City of New York. We stand as proud neighbors of Harlem School of the Arts, founded at St. James under the leadership of Dorothy Maynor in the pastorate of her husband, Rev. Shelby Rooks. We are also standing on the shoulders of the Rev. Lenton Gunn, whose ministry helped St. James grow as a community entity in Harlem. We also give a nod of gratitude to the Rev. Eugene Callendar, Stated Supply Pastor, who continued that ministry. 

Rev. Derrick McQueen, Ph. D., currently serving as pastor to the congregation and is also the third graduate of Union Theological Seminary to do so.  Rev. Dr. McQueen guided the congregation through an interim process of discernment and was chosen, after twenty years, as the next Called and Installed Pastor of St. James Presbyterian Church. St. James was one of the few churches in the country that never missed a worship service during the pandemic.
St. James is in active relationships with over 20 interfaith, intercultural, and community partners, and the list is growing!
Following in its abolitionist roots and Christ's call for freedom and justice, today, St. James still asks the Holy Spirit's guidance to help determine where Christ's gospel can speak to liberate today.