Christian Methodist Episcopal (CME)

The Christian Methodist Episcopal Church or the CME, composed of 80,000 African-Americans, peacefully split from the Methodist Episcopal Church in 1870. Like the United Methodist Church, they have bishops as the highest elected leaders of the church. They follow a certain government structure divided into three branches: legislative, executive, and judicial. They observe the sacraments of communion and baptism. They are distinctive in that they strive for a form of Christian perfectionism through God's grace.