| Chapter : | Introduction |
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However, the fight for racial equality continued. Harvard University professor James MacGregor Burns wrote of the effect of the protestors’ sacrifices upon American society:
During the 1970s and 1980s, the Assemblies of God began to publicize new ministry initiatives among African Americans. The Pentecostal Evangel reported the establishment of outreach efforts targeted toward urban centers across the United States. Attempts to minister to African Americans in suburban and rural areas developed at a much slower pace. Under the leadership of General Superintendent Thomas Zimmerman, the church’s colleges and universities began to aggressively recruit African American ministerial students. In addition, Zimmerman opened a dialogue with the small group of African American ministers licensed and ordained by the Assemblies of God in the 1960s in an effort to understand their concerns. Less than 10 African Americans were listed as Assemblies of God ministers before the early 1960s when, after a protracted effort, Robert Harrison was finally ordained and became the first African American Assemblies of God missionary since the 1920s. Finally, in an historic gesture, General Superintendent Thomas Trask, the highest-ranking officer in the Assemblies of God, participated in a ceremonial footwashing designed to demonstrate the church’s recognition of its racist past during the Memphis Colloquy of the Pentecostal Fellowship of North America in 1994.27