Roger Williams had been holding religious services in his home for nearly a year before he converted his congregation into a Baptist church in 1638.

Baptists in Rhode Island through most of the 17th century declined to erect meetinghouses because they felt such buildings reflected vanity.

Roger Williams was a Calvinist, but within a few years of its founding, the congregation became more Arminian, and was clearly a General Six-Principle Baptist church by 1652.

It remained a General Baptist church until it migrated back to a variety of Calvinism under the leadership of James Manning in the 1770s.

In 1700, Pardon Tillinghast built the first church building, a 400-square-foot (37 m2) structure, near the corner of Smith and North Main Streets.

[5] Due to the closure of the Massachusetts ports by the British as punishment for the Boston Tea Party, out-of-work ship builders and carpenters came to Providence to work on the meetinghouse.

[7] In 1957, John D. Rockefeller Jr. funded a restoration effort that removed Victorian additions to the building, returning much of the church's interior to its original appearance.

[8] Notably absent from the interior is a gallery originally constructed on the church's western side for use by slaves and free black residents of Providence.

[6] In addition to weekly worship services, the Meeting House hosts concerts, talks, and lectures by world-renowned artists, performers, academics, and elected officials.