c. 1997 Religion News Service

PORTSMOUTH, Va. _ The under-construction atmosphere of Greater Mount Zion Tabernacle Church of God in Christ is keeping its pastor awake at night.”I’m just so excited,”said Elder Charles Hicks, who said even at home his head remains filled with the sounds of hammers and saws.

After suffering the loss of his 102-year-old sanctuary at the hands of an arsonist in 1995, Hicks is seeing the resurrection of his church with the helping hands of volunteers.

The volunteers, students brought together by the nonprofit group Christmas in April, said they just want to right a wrong.”This was an opportunity to give back to people something that had been taken away,”said David Kanthor, a sophomore at Haverford College who led an interracial group of Pennsylvania students from Haverford and Bryn Mawr colleges to Portsmouth to spend their spring break working at the site.

The predominantly black church in downtown Portsmouth is just one of dozens of congregations being rebuilt after the spate of church fires that came to the nation’s attention last summer.

This spring, pastors like Hicks are witnessing the transformation of last year’s nationwide outpouring of cash, in-kind donations, and offers of volunteer labor into new physical structures to replace those consumed in flames.

The volunteers are working under the direction of partners of the National Council of Churches (NCC) _ such as the nonsectarian Christmas in April, relief groups and foundations. The temporary laborers range from families and students spending their vacations in the effort to 10-day blitzes like one just outside Tyronza, Ark., where St. Mark’s Missionary Baptist Church is expected to be ready for worship by Easter Sunday.”I’m really touched when I see the folks coming together,”said Sara Coppler, director of the ecumenical council’s Church Rebuilding Project, which is working with 54 churches ranging from those just starting to be rebuilt to those close to completion.”Really, honestly, these folks would not be side by side if they hadn’t come to rebuild. There’s a genuine love. I mean, it’s permanent,”she said.

That sense of permanence was evident among the students, church members, paid workers and volunteer cooks, who became a team devoted to the rebuilding of Greater Mount Zion.

On the last evening before some students departed, about 30 young people, church members and contractors filled a cramped”volunteer house,”where many students had slept each night, and took turns speaking into a video camera, uttering their thanks to each other for a week they would never forget.”I wish I could keep y’all here with me,”said Robert Hayes of Portsmouth, the drywall contractor who formed a particularly close relationship with the students during their week’s stay.

Elder Hicks called student Bernadine Dominique his”sugar dumpling”and recalled how she cut out the window in the drywall for the church’s sound room.

Earlier in the day, Dominique, 19 and a Bryn Mawr sophomore, sat on the edge of the emerging altar and, amid the sounds of hammering and”smooth jazz”on the radio, talked of how her beliefs as a member of the Church of the Brethren drove her to put her faith into action.”Instead of just sitting in the church … you have to get involved in your community, helping out other people,”she said.”It’s our duty to come … and do this.” Other students said their particular beliefs also motivated them to spend their spring break helping rebuild the church.

Dan Howell, a 19-year-old Haverford freshman, said he was from a predominantly white, rural Maryland town and was learning how much in common his Lutheran church at home had with this black, Pentecostal congregation.

Taking a break from helping brick the church’s exterior, Howell said he felt it is better to focus on rebuilding than retribution for the unknown arsonist.”Whoever did it is a coward,”he said.”It’s our responsibility as a community to fix the problem.” Although other students said their religious beliefs undergird their in-person social action, Jeff Smith, a 21-year-old atheist at Haverford, said his beliefs also applied to the situation.”I think people should believe whatever they want,”he said.”No one should try to stop them.” Such sentiments have fueled an outpouring of financial assistance for the houses of worship that have been the victims of arson.

The Rev. Joan Brown Campbell, NCC general secretary, reported at a Capitol Hill hearing March 19 that $25 million in resources have been focused on responding to the spate of fires.

At the same hearing, federal authorities said the National Church Arson Task Force, a cooperative effort of the U.S. Departments of Justice and Treasury, has begun investigations of 369 arsons, bombings or attempted bombings that have occurred between January 1995 and March 11, 1997. Since the beginning of 1995, federal and state officials have arrested 175 suspects in connection with 126 fires at houses of worship.

Even though all that remained of Greater Mount Zion was the charred rubble of the sanctuary and a free-standing wooden sign listing worship service, Evangelist Shirley Hines, the rebuilding coordinator, said the church never appeared on official lists of torched churches. But things turned around after she and Hicks spoke with federal and NCC officials at a conference last fall in South Carolina.

The church received a cash grant of up to $100,000 from the NCC and is finalizing a loan guaranteed by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development.

With donated materials and labor from volunteers, the church _ which Hines dubbed the”Miracle on 3100 Deep Creek Boulevard”_ now hopes to be finished by June.”I really thank God for them,”Hicks said of the volunteers.”They are a great inspiration. It makes me feel that there are people that you don’t know that care and can feel your pain.” (STORY MAY END HERE)

Thus far, close to 100 people have come to assist the Portsmouth church.

Hines said before students from Pennsylvania and Colorado arrived in mid-March,”every volunteer up to this point has been white.” Recalling high school and college students, a group of Mennonites and the lone man who traveled by camper and stayed a month, Hines said she believes these white people were bringing a symbolic message:”Everyone does not hate black people. Everyone is not a racist.” Even though each of the groups represented many religious persuasions, cultures and backgrounds, Hines believes there is a spiritual connection among all of them.”One thing that we have proven in this project is color doesn’t matter, religion doesn’t matter,”she told the departing students.”It’s what’s in the heart. I’m actually closer to you than I am to my brothers and sisters. This is God. This is spiritual.” In addition to the intangible bond between the black church members, contractors and cooks and the mostly white volunteers, there stands physical proof of the connections: the church now has its brick exterior, its shingled roof and its glass windows.

But perhaps the most tangible evidence of the success of the multiracial, multireligious project are the shiny, new keys Hicks received from his general contractor the day the Pennsylvania students said good-bye.

The 54-year-old pastor could hardly contain himself.”Having those keys, its just fantastic,”he said.”It is just a blessing from God. There’s no other way I can describe it and I say, to God be the glory.”

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