c. 2006 Religion News Service

SUMMIT, N.J. _ Fountain Baptist Church favors exuberance in worship, its members prodding their spirited pastor with approving nods and liberal supplies of amens.

The fervor of spirit at this suburban 108-year-old African-American church, nearly 2,000 members strong, is matched by a charitable heart _ and pocketbook _ that would set angels singing.

The church, which started as a humble meeting place for a handful of gardeners and domestic workers, has turned heads with the powerhouse sums it now gives to charitable causes around the world. The latest example is a $1 million pledge slated for hurricane recovery in the Gulf Coast, an amount considered quite generous for a major corporation or association, let alone a single church.

According to the Center on Philanthropy at Indiana University, which has monitored charitable gifts of over $1 million since 2000, it would be only the second time an American church has made a donation of such size. Oriental Mission Church in Los Angeles gave $3 million in 2001 to help victims of an earthquake in El Salvador.

Fountain Baptist held a “covenant signing” ceremony over the weekend, pledging the $1 million to the Lott Carey Baptist Foreign Mission Convention, and on Sunday (May 28) turned over its first installment, $300,000, to that Washington, D.C.-based organization, which will handle the money.

Fountain Baptist has tentatively slotted $400,000 of the donations for job and life-skills training for 200 families in Louisiana and Mississippi; $300,000 to help dozens of pastors whose churches were decimated by the storm through physical damage, deaths of members or relocations; $200,000 for housing and community-building projects; and $100,000 for general and administrative costs.

“What one African-American church is doing as a witness to the glory of God is an example of what others can do,” said Horace Baldwin, one of three Fountain Baptist members and five ministers who traveled to Louisiana and Mississippi in March to determine the fundraiser’s priorities.

“More than the focus on $1 million … it’s a witness for the benefit of those people affected by the hurricane,” he said. “Some of them have had their hopes shattered, their dreams crushed. To have a church so removed from the damage site help, serves as a witness to them that there is still a God.”

The vast majority of the money is expected to come directly from church members. Besides the $300,000 initial installment, the church already has another $500,000 in pledges, putting it four-fifths of the way there, said the pastor, the Rev. J. Michael Sanders.

With about 1,900 members, the church will meet its goal if each member gives, on average, a little more than $500.

“It’ll happen,” said member Ron Thomas. “We’re a giving church, with the leadership of our pastor, who has shown us you can give and it doesn’t hurt. Everybody does their part.”

Thomas, like other church members interviewed, used what is a common saying at the church: “Not equal giving, but equal sacrifice,” meaning everyone gives what they can.

Parishioner Gregory Edwards said he and his wife prayed over how much to give, then prayed over it again, and decided they could afford $1,000.

“The commitment we made may sound tough at times, but we know the Lord’s going to carry us through it,” he said.

Through prior campaigns the church has donated $400,000 to the United Negro College Fund; $300,000 for a building for Baptist Convention headquarters in South Africa; tens of thousands of dollars a year to help 850 students in Kenya; and, for its 100th anniversary in 1998, $10,000 apiece to 10 nonprofit organizations and charities in Union County, New Jersey.

Many churches along the Gulf Coast have lost more than half their memberships. Fountain Baptist wants to help run retreats for pastors to give them ideas about how to rebuild or merge churches that may have different prayer styles or policies on women ministers.

Fountain Baptist generally reserves its large donations for abroad, but “I don’t think we have ever witnessed a need as great as that in the Gulf Coast,” said the Rev. Betty Adams, who lost her aunt in the hurricane and whose brother’s family had to relocate from New Orleans.

The March trip showed the church travelers how some areas have made only baby steps of recovery.

“I found it hard to believe, particularly in New Orleans, that not much had changed other than that it had just dried out,” said Robert Jackson, a church member. “My expectation was I would get there and see lots of heavy equipment moving … manpower and cleanup. And I saw nothing of the kind.”

On Sunday, a Louisiana pastor, the Rev. Samuel Tolbert, general secretary of the National Baptist Convention of America, came to Fountain Baptist for the ceremony and praised the church.

“It says to the world … that there must be some kind of harmony at Fountain Baptist Church, to be able to make that kind of commitment,” Tolbert said.

Such a large donation from one church surprised people familiar with national philanthropy patterns.

“It definitely makes you stop and say, `Wow, one church,”’ said Barbara Leopold of the Center on Philanthropy and Civil Society at the City University of New York. “It’s on par with (gifts from) large umbrella organizations, either national or regional.”

For example, shortly after the storm last year, Wal-Mart and Enterprise Rent-A-Car donated $1 million each, through the American Red Cross, and the Knights of Columbus announced a donation of $2.5 million.

In a recovery whose total costs will be tens of billions, Fountain Baptist’s members have kept their perspective.

“There’s no question, when you look at the breadth of the problem, that we’re talking about a proverbial drop in the bucket,” Jackson said. “But what we believe wholeheartedly, given the size of our congregation, is, if we make a commitment of a million dollars or more in the next year or so, that will make other people give even more and serve as a magnet for other people who want to work with us.”

(Jeff Diamant is a staff writer for The Star-Ledger of Newark, N.J.)

KRE/PH END DIAMANT

Editors: To obtain photos of Fountain Baptist Church and Sanders, go to the RNS Web site at https://religionnews.com. On the lower right, click on “photos,” then search by subject or slug.

A version of this story is also being transmitted by Newhouse News Service

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