HUNTSVILLE, Ala. (WAFF) – Lowe’s Chapel United Methodist Church will celebrate its 150th anniversary and 63rd annual harvest celebration Sunday, Nov. 15, at 2:30 p.m. Bishop L. Jonathan Holston, Presiding Bishop of the North Alabama Conference, The United Methodist Church, will be the guest preacher.
The church began meeting in the 1840s
The congregation has worshipped together since the 1800s. The church sits along Sanderson Street in Huntsville. The Rev. Dr. Wylheme H. Ragland, pastor of Lowe’s Chapel United Methodist Church, said the church’s beginning was in the 1840s, when many of its members were enslaved. He said the Methodist Episcopal Church South had a mission in West Madison County at that time.
After emancipation and the Civil War, members met in a society, Ragland said. He said that is a Methodist name meaning the lay people met to read scripture and encourage one another.
Church documents list the congregation’s founding in 1872 with the Methodist Episcopal Church, Alabama Conference.
Namesake escaped slavery, joined the Union Army
Ragland said the church is named for a man who risked his life to find and fight for freedom…