118th Session of the Indiana Annual Conference of the A.M.E. Zion Church

The 118^th Session of the Indiana Annual Conference of The A.M.E. Zion Church Denomination will be hosted by Wallace Temple A.M.E. Zion Church, 1518 Forkner Street, Anderson, IN, Thursday, June 4 – Sunday, June 7. Rev. Timothy L. Taylor is the host pastor. Having hosted the Conference many times in its 105-year-old history, the last time Wallace Temple had the honor of hosting it was the 111^th Session in 2019.

John Bostic Jr. and Priscilla Diane Davis are the Co-chairpersons. Along with their Conference Committee of church Trustees, Truddie Evans, Charles Hobson, Shirley Weatherly, and Stewards Brandie Hobson, Carolyn Scott, and Cheryl Wright, they have been busy for months meeting with the pastor and members preparing the City and the Church facility to receive approximately 125 A.M.E. Zion Church pastors, ministers, evangelists, missionaries, officers, delegates and lay members from across the region.

The public is invited to the open worship services on Thursday and Friday at 7:00 PM, Sunday at 10:00 AM, and Saturday at 10:45 AM for the Children and Youth Worship Service.

Bishop Daran H. Mitchell, Presiding Prelate of the Midwest Episcopal District of The A.M.E. Zion Church, will receive an official welcome to the city on opening night from Mayor Thomas L. Broderick Jr, City of Anderson. Mitchell, who resides in Greensboro, NC, oversees churches in Indiana, Illinois, Kentucky, Michigan, Missouri, Tennessee, and the Caribbean country of Trinidad-Tobago.

Other Church Officials on the Conference agenda are Rev. L. Lynn Mitchell, Missionary Supervisor, Midwest Episcopal District, officiating the Missionary Convocation on Friday morning; and The Lay Hour on Thursday afternoon will be led by Dr. Janet Evelyn, Indiana Conference Lay Council President.

The African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church (A.M.E. Zion) is not to be confused with the similarly named African Methodist Episcopal Church (A.M.E.). Historians inform that the A.M.E. Church was officially formed in 1816 in Philadelphia, and the A.M.E. Zion Church was officially founded in 1821 in New York, but operated several years before then. Known as The Freedom Church, its former members include some of this country’s most renowned freedom fighters: Frederick Douglass, Paul Robeson, Sojourner Truth, and Harriet Tubman, who deeded her property in Auburn, NY to The A.M.E. Zion Church that maintains it as part of a National Park.

Although the A.M.E. Zion Church was founded so that African Americans could have equal rights in the Methodist Episcopal Church, the membership is composed of people of all racial backgrounds. Everyone is Welcome!

The Church's structural hierarchy begins with and includes the General Conference, Board of Bishops, General Officers, Annual Conferences, District Conferences, Quarterly Conferences, and ends with the Local Church and its officers and members.

The Annual Conference is a geographic regional gathering led by a presiding bishop to handle regional administrative, financial, and spiritual needs, and it is here that pastors receive their annual appointments.

The Indiana Annual Conference is comprised of nine churches located in Central Indiana and Southern Illinois and has two Districts. Rev. Dr. Anthony K.R. Gibson, a former pastor of Wallace Temple, is the Presiding Elder for the Indianapolis District that includes Anderson and five churches in Indianapolis. Three churches in the Southern Illinois District were overseen by the late Presiding Elder Rev. Val J. Powe, who passed away on March 11, 2026, and whose successor will be announced at the Conference.

Bostic and Davis are both Church Trustees, Ushers, lifelong members, and descendants of Wallace Temple’s Founding Family. Bostic is the great-nephew of the founding pastor, Rev. Henry H. Horton, and Davis is the great-granddaughter of the 1^st First Lady of Wallace Temple, Cora Dollison Steans Horton. Following in the footsteps of their Christian ancestors and other church leaders, their life of service to God, A.M.E. Zion, their church, community, and family honors the lives and faithfulness of those who paved the way before them.