The lay devotional activities that the pastors encouraged can explain the levels of black participation in these three churches. These activities also suggest that blacks and whites experienced interracial religious activities outside of Sunday services. The pastors at these three churches were more likely than some of their colleagues to visit the homes of parishioners and encourage religious societies. In these visits, the pastors asked enslaved servants about their religious beliefs, encouraged masters to educate their slaves in Christian doctrines, and catechized white as well as black children. Joseph Sewall stated in a 1716 sermon that “Heads of Families” should teach family members “the good Knowledge of the Lord” and “Catechise their Children and Servants.” Benjamin Colman went even further in a 1728 sermon, arguing that those fathers and masters who did not teach Christianity to their children, servants, and slaves risked eternal damnation. Colman warned, “His Offspring and Servants will rise up in Judgment against him, and accuse him, that he never instructed them by Word and Example in the Worship and Fear of God.” For these Christians, patriarchal privilege theoretically came with the ideal of patriarchal responsibility.49
These pastors encouraged religious meetings among pious parishioners, in which laymen and laywomen prayed, sang, and read scripture together and where ministers occasionally preached. These activities encouraged black participation in Boston’s churches. Black people, who heard the encouragements to meet privately for devotional activities, formed religious societies that complemented their attendance at regular church services (some of these societies included Indians and whites too). Reverends George Whitefield and Daniel Rogers each preached to assemblies or societies of black people in Boston. Later written accounts from enslaved and free blacks testify to the role that family devotions and conversations with white pastors had in their movement toward Christianity. Old South Church, Brattle Church, and New North Church baptized blacks before and after the Great Awakening, but they baptized and admitted a greater number of black people during the years 1740 to 1743, when revivalism was strongest in Boston. All these factors combined, including pastoral visitation, catechisms, fervent preaching, and private religious societies, led to 112 black people being baptized in these three churches compared to 63 black people being baptized in the other six Congregational churches. Evidence suggests that more black people were baptized in “New Light” Congregational churches than in “Old Light” churches, but the percentages of baptisms that were black people and black people’s rates of affiliation in Anglican churches complicate this narrative.50
The six other Congregational churches in Boston generally contrast with the three churches above because they had fewer black baptisms, but in one of them, the percentage of black baptism was relatively high. The ministers of all these churches did not participate in the revival movement or did not as energetically encourage devotional practice outside the church walls. In total, these six churches baptized sixty-three people of African descent between 1730 and 1749, with twenty-two of these baptisms occurring at Second Church. At Second Church, 3.53 percent of all baptisms were of black people, which was a relatively high percentage among Boston churches and suggests that this church was as attractive to black people as the “New Light” congregations.51 The absence of activist pastors and opposition to the changing religious culture of the Great Awakening in these six Congregational churches account for the fewer total baptisms and the lower numbers of black baptisms. Opposition or indifference from some people to black participation might have also existed in these churches. Boston Anglican minister Roger Price wrote in 1739 that the “baptizing of negroes is too much neglected,” which suggests that some Bostonians were at least indifferent to baptizing slaves, but all of Boston’s Congregational churches baptized some black people.52
Boston’s three Anglican churches also had significant variance in the number of black baptisms. King’s Chapel baptized nine black people, but Christ Church baptized fifty-five blacks between 1730 and 1749, which was 5.5 percent of the roughly one thousand total baptisms. Of these, twenty-five can be identified as female and twenty-two as male. Considering both the percentage and the absolute number of baptisms, Christ Church’s minister Timothy Cutler baptized more black people than any other Boston church (even though he was a consistent opponent of Whitefield and the revivals). It seems likely that black people were often in attendance at Christ Church’s services, including some who were never baptized. The claim that masters were hesitant to baptize their slaves does not seem to apply to this church. As was the case with northern Anglicans in general, an opportunity to gain an education and outreach by Reverend Cutler to enslaved blacks likely contributed to the high rate of black affiliation in this congregation.53
The blacks and Indians who joined the churches that opposed the new religious practices of the awakenings may not have needed enthusiastic revivalism to find meaning in Christianity, including the few who were baptized at the antirevivalist Hollis Street Church. Among the people affiliated with Hollis Street Church was Primus, an “Indian servant belonging to Hon. Anthony Stoddard,” baptized in 1738, and Dinah, “negro servant to Deacon Clough,” baptized in 1742.54 Some members of the Clough family were already members of this church when Dinah was baptized, but Stoddard and his family do not appear elsewhere in these church records. Primus had no obvious connection to this church, such as a master or employer who attended. In his case and for the free black people who affiliated, we can assume they chose to attend this particular church. Some of the blacks baptized at Hollis Street were free, including John Cuffee, a “free negro” who was baptized in 1746, and a free black child named Sarah Vingus, who was baptized on October 19, 1735.
Sarah Vingus was the seven-year-old daughter of John Vingus, and their affiliation with Hollis Street Church is best understood in a wider Atlantic context. In order to have his daughter baptized, John Vingus owned the covenant on the day she was baptized. Like many white parents in New England, the desire to have his child baptized was the immediate cause of Vingus’s official affiliation with this church. These church records describe John Vingus as “a free negro, baptized in his own country by a Romish priest, who also owned the covenant with us.” In all likelihood, “his own country” was somewhere in Africa, perhaps the Kingdom of Kongo, whereby Kongolese royalty and others had practiced Catholicism since the end of the fifteenth century. It is also possible that “his own country” could have been a Spanish or Portuguese colony.55 If he came from Kongo, then John Vingus was likely raised as a Roman Catholic and baptized and catechized as such. We do not know when or under what circumstances he reached Boston, but he was there and was free since at least 1725, when he married Parthenia Barteno. They were listed as “free negroes” when married by Peter Thatcher, associate minister of the New North Church. Perhaps he crossed the Atlantic as a free person, or perhaps he was brought as a slave and regained his freedom. Whatever the case, it was important to him that his daughter be baptized, and he was willing to ascribe to the doctrines