Religion and the British Methodist Episcopal Church

The church was the most important institution in most Black communities. Church leaders were often spokespersons to the larger community.

The denominations were usually Baptist or Methodist. Baptist congregations encouraged a democratic participation by the election of their ministers. Black Methodists, coldly received in White congregations, turned to the African Methodist Episcopal church, which entered the colony from the United States in 1838 and by 1840 had organized an Upper Canada Conference. The Conference was instrumental in supplying the church with ministers and sending bishops occasionally to oversee its work. In 1856, feelings arose that reforms had to take place, and an independent British Methodist Episcopal Church was formed.

A British Methodist Episcopal (BME) Church was started in Guelph in 1870, in a frame building on Market Street. Rev. Thomas Jefferson was pastor. The original congregation was comprised of former fugitive slaves from the United States. On September 18, 1880, numerous citizens gathered to witness the laying of the cornerstone of the new stone church on Essex Street.

The 1882-83 Guelph City Directory described the church as a "stone building, in course of completion but sufficiently advanced to enable public services to be held in it; when finished it will have a seating capacity of 300. The estimated cost of the building is $2,000". The BME church offered public services at 11 am and 6:30 pm, as well as a Sabbath School at 3 pm. Prayer meetings were held every Thursday and the Rev. Junius B. Roberts presided over the church's 40 members.

The Essex Street BME church, like others in Ontario, was said to represent a new life for former fugitive slaves and their families. Rev. Davis, the current minister, believes that the congregation has "a new chance to say the efforts of 1880 were not in vain. A lot of things associated with Blacks were destroyed - this church was preserved".