Again in September 1963, a bomb was detonated on the sixteenth Road Baptist Church in Birmingham, Alabama, killing 4 harmless Black ladies and injuring dozens extra. A white supremacist terrorist group had dedicated the heinous crime.
Black church buildings have at all times been underneath the specter of destruction for the mere act of congregating. The Nationwide Belief for Historic Preservation has taken discover. Via its African American Cultural Heritage Motion Fund, it’s awarding $8.5 million in grants to 30 traditionally Black church buildings as part of its third annual Preserving Black Church buildings grant program. The Motion Fund is the nation’s largest useful resource devoted to preserving historic African American websites.
Black church buildings have served as a haven for individuals of coloration to unite of their religion and as an area to enact change. From his pulpit at Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta, Georgia, Martin Luther King, Jr. galvanized the group within the rise of the Civil Rights motion.
However the specter of assault is at all times looming. In November 2022, two church buildings, Higher Bethlehem Temple Church and Epiphany Church, in Jackson, Mississippi, burned in a single day. “I’ve seen church buildings burn in my hometown of Tulsa, Oklahoma,” an EBONY reader shared.
These 30 worship websites will obtain grants starting from $50,000 to $500,000 to assist ongoing and deliberate restoration work. Based on the group, it “will assist congregations deal with pressing preservation challenges comparable to demolition threats, deferred upkeep and structural points, along with offering crucial assets to assist congregations strengthen their stewardship plans, improve asset administration and develop fundraising capability nationwide.”
Listed here are the 2025 Preserving Black Church buildings Grantees :
Historic Bethel Baptist Church – Birmingham, AL
St. Paul United Methodist Church – Birmingham, AL
First Congregational Church of Marion – Marion, AL
GLIDE Memorial Church – San Francisco, CA
Zoar Methodist Episcopal Church – Odessa, DE
West Hunter Road Baptist Church – Atlanta, GA
First African Methodist Episcopal Church of Athens Inc. – Athens, GA
St. James AME Church – Columbus, GA
Ninth Road Missionary Baptist Church – Lawrence, KS
Saint John African Methodist Episcopal Church – Frankfort, KY
Antioch Baptist Church – Shreveport, LA
Quinn Chapel African Methodist Episcopal Church – Frederick, MD
New Bethel Baptist Church – Detroit, MI
Anna Bell Chapel A.M.E. Church – New Haven, MO
St. Alphonsus Liguori “Rock” Catholic Church – St. Louis, MO
AME Zion Church of Kingston – Kingston, NY
The AME Zion Church Inc. – Charlotte, NC
Dickerson Chapel AME Church – Hillsborough, NC
St. Mark’s Presbyterian Church – Cleveland, OH
Campbell African Methodist Episcopal Church of Media – Media, PA
Bethel African Methodist Episcopal Church – Lancaster, PA
Soapstone Baptist Church – Marietta, SC
New Tabernacle Fourth Baptist Church – Charleston, SC
Taveau Church – Camden, SC
Historic Pickett Chapel – Lebanon, TN
Dabney Hill Missionary Baptist Church, Inc. – Snook Hill, TX
Boynton United Methodist Church – Houston, TX
Mount Carmel Missionary Baptist Church – Milwaukee, WI
New Salem Baptist Church – Elkins, WV
