AMEZ Church Launches Voter Initiative During N.C. Meeting

By Rosaland Tyler
Associate Editor
New Journal and Guide

Newly elected AME Zion bishops launched a voter initiative drive during their five-day quadrennial meeting that more than 3,000 congregants attended July 24-28 in Greensboro, N.C.

Guest speakers included the Rev. William Barber II and the Rev. Al Sharpton, president of the National Action Network. The denomination has 1.2 million members.

“Each area was challenged to register a minimum of 1,000 new voters,” the Rev. George McKain, a consultant and former public affairs director for the denomination, told Religion News Service in a recent interview.

Among those elected during the meeting was Bishop Melanie Miller, who will lead the Western District, which includes several states in the American West.

Miller, who was pastor of St. Paul AME Zion Church in Ewing, N.J., becomes the second and now only living woman bishop in the historically Black denomination.

Bishop Bernardo Ngunza, who will lead the Central Southern Africa District, is the first Indigenous bishop to serve in the district that includes several African countries, including South Africa.

The others elected to lead districts of the AME Zion Church are: Bishop Daran Mitchell, who pastored Trinity AME Zion Church in Greensboro and will lead the Mid-West District; Bishop Anthony Witherspoon, who led Metropolitan AME Zion Church in St. Louis and will oversee the Southwestern Delta District. Bishop Dwayne Walker, who pastored Little Rock AME Zion Church in Charlotte, N.C. will lead the Alabama-Florida District.

The new bishops will join others in leading a restructured AME Zion Church, said McKain.

He said that a new church growth and development department is the result of a merger of home missions and evangelism. Likewise, the church literature department was folded into the Christian education department.

“It’s been a process and this is the conclusion of it,” McKain said.