Mason Temple, Church of God in Christ

About this property

Mason Temple, located in Memphis, Tennessee, is a Christian international sanctuary and central headquarters of the Church of God in Christ, the largest African American Pentecostal group in the world. The building was named for Bishop Charles Harrison Mason, founder of the Church of God in Christ, who is entombed in a marble crypt inside the Temple. Mason Temple was the site of Martin Luther King Jr.'s 1968 "I've Been to the Mountaintop" speech the night before his assassination. Mason Temple was founded by Charles Harrison Mason (1864–1961). This church's denomination, Church of God in Christ, also known as C.O.G.I.C, grew fast in Memphis, Tennessee and eventually spread to other parts of the world such as Latin America and Asia. Mason Temple was the largest church building owned by a predominantly black Christian denomination in the United States at its opening. Born in 1864 to former slaves, Mason founded the largest Pentecostal denomination in the U.S. which has more than 7.5 million members. Mason obtained a preaching license from Mount Gayle Missionary Baptist Church in Little Rock, Arkansas. He was then cast out for preaching about holiness and sanctification. With the help of exiled members, Mason established the Church of God in Christ. It consisted of 110 churches spread across Mississippi, Arkansas, Oklahoma, and Texas. Around that time, Mason attended the Azusa Street Revival where he was taught that he would receive the act of speaking in tongues once baptized in the Holy Spirit. On that night, he spoke in tongues. After he returned, he found himself in a disagreement about the anointing of the Holy Spirit which led to another split in the church. He took 10 churches with him and kept the Church of God in Christ name. Mason spent most of his years teaching in Arkansas. He came to Memphis in 1907 attend the first meeting of the Pentecostal General Assembly of the Church of God in Christ. By 1997, the denomination grew to 5.2 million members. In the 1950s and 1960s, Mason Temple became a critical destination for many civil rights events in Memphis. Martin Luther King Jr., Andrew Young, and Ralph Abernathy were among the many black leaders who came to Memphis to assist the 1,300 protesting sanitation workers who usually met at the church. Together, they fought for better working conditions for black sanitation workers as they earned low wages and were treated differently from the white workers. Martin Luther King Jr. later delivered his famous last speech: "I've Been to the Mountaintop" on April 3, 1968. The next day King was assassinated outside of his room at the Lorraine Motel. A plaque on an exterior wall near the entrance to the church details the event.

Location

Categories

Property data from the National Register of Historic Places, National Park Service (public domain).

Description adapted from Wikipedia under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.

More in Shelby County

Historic places, battles, and census history across Shelby County.

More historic places in Tennessee

Browse all historic places in Tennessee.

Conflict records

Explore 19,000+ military engagements across American history.

Tennessee history

Colonial settlement, territorial period, and statehood narrative.