Theologian · Modern
William J. Seymour
1870–1922 · Azusa Street Pentecostalism; Wesleyan Holiness
Baptized a Catholic in infancy, he became a Holiness preacher and the father of Pentecostalism; the Catholic Charismatic Renewal (from 1967) and the International Catholic-Pentecostal Dialogue (from 1972) are the Church's answer to the movement he began.
Born to formerly enslaved parents in Louisiana and baptized a Catholic as an infant, Seymour passed through the Holiness movement, sat outside the door of Charles Parham's segregated Bible school in Houston to hear the teaching that tongues are the sign of baptism in the Holy Spirit, and in 1906 led the revival at 312 Azusa Street in Los Angeles from which Pentecostalism spread across the world. Blind in one eye and gentle in manner, he preached the Wesleyan stages of justification, entire sanctification and Spirit baptism, divine healing, the soon return of Christ, and a worship in which black and white, men and women, prayed and prophesied together: ‘the color line was washed away in the blood’. His paper The Apostolic Faith (1906-1908) carried the message; after schisms led by white associates he wrote the Doctrines and Discipline of the mission (1915), in which love, not tongues, is the surest evidence of the Spirit.
Why he matters: Pentecostal and charismatic Christianity, now the largest Protestant family and the one Catholics in Latin America and Africa meet daily, traces to his mission; the Catholic Charismatic Renewal, Kilian McDonnell's dialogue documents and Pope Francis's friendship with Pentecostal pastors all answer Azusa Street. His interracial church was decades ahead of American Christianity.
Where to be careful
He held Scripture as the sole rule, baptism and the Supper as ordinances rather than sacraments (Trent, Session 7), a restorationism for which the apostolic faith had been lost since the early Church, and a datable second and third work of grace that Trent's one justification does not know. Common ground: real gifts of the Spirit for all the baptized (Lumen Gentium 12), holiness of life, prayer for healing, and a church without the color line.
Reading
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The Doctrines and Discipline of the Azusa Street Apostolic Faith MissionWilliam J. Seymour · His 1915 rule, where love and unity outrank tongues.
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The Azusa Street Mission and RevivalCecil M. Robeck Jr. · The standard history, by the Pentecostal co-chair of the Catholic-Pentecostal dialogue.
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Christian Initiation and Baptism in the Holy SpiritKilian McDonnell and George T. Montague · The Catholic reading of ‘baptism in the Spirit’ as the grace of the sacraments stirred up.
Documented positions
Where this thinker stands on each dispute the test covers.