The initiative to save lots of historic Black church buildings has aided 108 congregations since 2023.
March 2, 2025
Black church buildings throughout the nation lately had been awarded greater than $8 million in grants, a part of an effort to protect buildings that performed important roles in Black historical past.
The grants, starting from $50,000 to $500,000 and totaling $8.5 million, had been introduced on Feb. 24 and went to 30 church buildings. They had been awarded by the African American Cultural Heritage Motion Fund, a program operated by the nonprofit Nationwide Belief for Historic Preservation, with assist from Lilly Endowment Inc.
Since its inception in 2023, the $60 million Preserving Black Church buildings initiative has labored with 108 congregations and invested $19.5 million, mentioned Brent Leggs, the manager director of the fund and a senior vp on the Nationwide Belief for Historic Preservation.
“We wished to leverage the instruments of historic preservation to make sure the long-term viability and sustainability of those historic landmarks which can be essential in understanding the material of American life and historical past,” Mr. Leggs mentioned.
The Nationwide Belief for Historic Preservation calls Black church buildings “the oldest establishments created and managed by African Individuals.” However lately, congregation numbers have declined, with many church buildings struggling to draw youthful folks. The grants are aimed toward addressing “pressing preservation challenges akin 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 fund-raising capability nationwide,” in keeping with a information launch.
The grants had been issued to church buildings in 19 states, from Alabama to California. Among the church buildings had been stops alongside the Underground Railroad, whereas others had been pivotal through the civil rights motion.
A $500,000 grant will assist the New Bethel Baptist Church in Detroit set up a brand new roof and restore water harm. The church was commissioned in 1961 by the Rev. C.L. Franklin, the daddy of Aretha Franklin. Planning for the Stroll to Freedom, a march of civil rights activists by way of Detroit in 1963, befell there, in keeping with the information launch.
“The church itself is simply held in excessive regard within the metropolis of Detroit,” mentioned Dr. James Weathers, a member of the church’s board of trustees. “And for us to have a church that’s held in that kind of regard, to have people are available there and see it wanting in disrepair, was only a disgrace, and it was actually embarrassing.”
The A.M.E. Zion Church Inc., headquartered in Charlotte, N.C., obtained an identical grant of $500,000. The African Methodist Episcopal Zion (A.M.E.Z.) church is a Christian denomination organized in 1821, with notable members together with Harriet Tubman, Sojourner Fact and Frederick Douglass.
The grant has helped set up a denomination-wide preservation endowment, which might be obtainable to the roughly 1,600 A.M.E.Z. church buildings throughout the nation, mentioned Rev. Dr. Eleazar Merriweather, the group’s govt director of church progress and growth. It received’t be sufficient to assist each single church, he mentioned, however it should assist these which can be going by way of “hardship.”
“This fund could be there to assist assist them by way of their powerful occasions, if you’ll, or difficult occasions,” Rev. Merriweather mentioned.
