Eglise presbytérienne du Libéria

The beginning of the evangelization process by the church and the founding of Liberia by the American Colonization Society (ACS) went hand in hand. While the ACS focused on the generation of funds to repatriate Africans to their native land, the church concentrated on the raising of resources to begin evangelizing among the indigenous people who continued to inhabit the land now identified as the future home of those repatriated. The First Presbyterian Church was established in Liberia in 1833, by a pastor who later became Associate Justice of Liberia. Under the auspices of the Western Foreign Missionary Society the first Presbyterian missionary arrived in 1834 and started the first Presbyterian missionary work in the country. In 1837, the Board of Foreign Missions of the Presbyterian Church in the USA, successor of the Western Missionary Society, took over the mission in Liberia. Twelve years later the church established the Alexander High School in Monrovia, which was later moved elsewhere for financial reasons.

The impact on Liberia of the Presbyterian Church is demonstrated by the fact that a significant number of the independence and post-independence leaders were either leaders of the Presbyterian Church or educated at the Alexander High School. The fifth moderator of the PCL wrote in the late 1870s to his counterparts in the New York Presbytery: "In announcing the fact that I have been nominated by an almost unanimous vote of the Board of Trustees to the Presidency of Liberia College, I cannot help calling your attention to the influence which Presbyterianism has exerted and is still exerting in Liberia. All the leading men of the country are now either Presbyterians or have been educated by Presbyterians."

The PCL has been actively involved together with the other churches in Liberia in the efforts to end the armed conflicts of recent years and continues to take part in reconciliation and care for the displaced and other victims, and in the building of a democratic society.