A Brief History of the UCC

The UCC is a relatively new denomination, founded in 1957 in Cleveland, Ohio. The national headquarters are still there.  It was created with the merger of the Evangelical & Reformed Church and the Congregational Christian Churches. Each of those churches had in turn been created with mergers of other churches: From the earliest times, the churches which have become the UCC has been a church of firsts:

- 1777:   The Liberty Bell is hidden from the British under the floorboards of Zion Reformed Church in Philadelphia

- 1785:  The first African American ordained by Protestant Demonation: Lemuel Haynes

- 1839:   Abolitionists like Congregationalist Joshua Leavitt work to free the slaves who revolted on the ship Amistad.

- 1853:   Antoinette Brown is the first woman ordained as a Christian minister,

- 1889:   The Deaconess Society, Home, and Hospital are all founded in St. Louis

- 1943:   Reinhold Niebuhr, from Wright City, MO, preaches a sermon containing what we now know as the Serenity Prayer

- 1959:   Everett Parker, of the UCC's Office of Communication wins a court case against TV stations repressing news 

- 1972:   Ordination of the first openly gay minister – Rev. William R. Johnson.

- 1985:   The General Synod adopts a resolution for churches to actively welcome members of the LGBT community into the church,

- 1993:   The UCC apologies to the Native Hawaiians for their actions taken during 1820-50.

- 1995:  The first hymnal is published that honors both male and female images of God: The New Century Hymnal

- 2005:  A Marriage Equality Resolution supporting same gender marriage is adopted at the General Synod

Source:  The United Church of Christ's Firsts 

For more about the history of the United Church of Christ, click here.