Dr. David Wright Sr is fundraising
Community Church Of God in Christ Restoration
500 feet from the former Robert E. Lee statue looming over our front steps is the Community Church of God in Christ.
Established 111 years ago and is the oldest Pentecostal church in Richmond. 50 years ago the congregation relocated from its last location in Fulton Bottom. The leader of the congregation, the late Bishop David Love had them purchase the Former Park Avenue Methodist church, a church on the historic Registry of Richmond. Being led as he believed by God to establish a church that will bring blacks and whites together one day.
Where we need your help:
The Park Ave Methodist Church suffered a horrendous fire in the 1950s. They decided not to restore the church to its original beauty. Not restoring the church after the fire has presented numerous problems architecturally and is causing the church more damage.
The church is a historic registered building so the congregation located the original architectural designs and decided to embark on the task of restoration with the help of the state and federal tax credits and contributions available. After completing phases one and two in the restoration procedure funds ran out to pay for the reconstruction.
Costs for phase 3 in the restoration process already incurred and debts totaling approximately $100,000 we need now. We want to restore and rebuild not only our facilities for our congregational use but for the continuous needs of our local fan District and greater Richmond communities.
Current Community outreach:
The use of the facilities has never stopped with additional rooms with which to have limited space services, the church has remained open with outreaches to the greater Richmond community.
To address the ongoing problems of ethnic divisions as protest began around the removal of the Robert E Lee statue 500 feet away from the church. We were led to help with the needs of both the community (that is the Fan) and the protesters. We offered meeting space to help mediate factions among the protesting groups.
We provided at the complaints of some residents Porta potties for the crowds assembled for we realized that our limited access facilities were insufficient to meet the needs of the upwards of 500 protesters.
When complaints were lodged about the Porta potties our response was these are human beings and there are no places within a 10 or more block radius other than alleyways and front lawns for these primarily young persons to relieve themselves.
The church also provided space in our office area to have meetings with the police of Richmond and the protesters. The various factions around the Robert E Lee Monument with the help of the police met with the pastor to help each other understand how to handle the various vantage points of the police and the protesters and come to some resolve to work together in peace. The dialogue tremendously helped decrease the tensions.
The church offered and provided food in abundance weekly to get them the nourishment needed and encouragement. We also offered the George Floyd memorial garden group to use our property to plant and grow their garden when forced by the state police to remove their plants from state and local property. In response to neighbors’ concerns about the language of the protesters for black and brown unity, we renamed the garden, the Community Church Unity Garden noting that God’s human garden has a variety of colorful persons as does his vegetation red, brown, black, yellow and white. With the produce, donations were made to area free food giveaway outlets to the community and made available to the fan residents. The neighbors greatly appreciated and accepted the garden also for their use for their families.
The church has provided office space to the Black Lives Matter group of Richmond for them to have a food and clothing pantry and meeting space going on now.
Help is needed now.
As a monthly partner or one time gift all contributions are tax deductible.
Thank you in advance,
Dr. David Wright, MD, MAR, MDIV
Community Church of God in Christ
1801 Park Ave
Richmond VA 23220
Established 111 years ago and is the oldest Pentecostal church in Richmond. 50 years ago the congregation relocated from its last location in Fulton Bottom. The leader of the congregation, the late Bishop David Love had them purchase the Former Park Avenue Methodist church, a church on the historic Registry of Richmond. Being led as he believed by God to establish a church that will bring blacks and whites together one day.
Where we need your help:
The Park Ave Methodist Church suffered a horrendous fire in the 1950s. They decided not to restore the church to its original beauty. Not restoring the church after the fire has presented numerous problems architecturally and is causing the church more damage.
The church is a historic registered building so the congregation located the original architectural designs and decided to embark on the task of restoration with the help of the state and federal tax credits and contributions available. After completing phases one and two in the restoration procedure funds ran out to pay for the reconstruction.
Costs for phase 3 in the restoration process already incurred and debts totaling approximately $100,000 we need now. We want to restore and rebuild not only our facilities for our congregational use but for the continuous needs of our local fan District and greater Richmond communities.
Current Community outreach:
The use of the facilities has never stopped with additional rooms with which to have limited space services, the church has remained open with outreaches to the greater Richmond community.
To address the ongoing problems of ethnic divisions as protest began around the removal of the Robert E Lee statue 500 feet away from the church. We were led to help with the needs of both the community (that is the Fan) and the protesters. We offered meeting space to help mediate factions among the protesting groups.
We provided at the complaints of some residents Porta potties for the crowds assembled for we realized that our limited access facilities were insufficient to meet the needs of the upwards of 500 protesters.
When complaints were lodged about the Porta potties our response was these are human beings and there are no places within a 10 or more block radius other than alleyways and front lawns for these primarily young persons to relieve themselves.
The church also provided space in our office area to have meetings with the police of Richmond and the protesters. The various factions around the Robert E Lee Monument with the help of the police met with the pastor to help each other understand how to handle the various vantage points of the police and the protesters and come to some resolve to work together in peace. The dialogue tremendously helped decrease the tensions.
The church offered and provided food in abundance weekly to get them the nourishment needed and encouragement. We also offered the George Floyd memorial garden group to use our property to plant and grow their garden when forced by the state police to remove their plants from state and local property. In response to neighbors’ concerns about the language of the protesters for black and brown unity, we renamed the garden, the Community Church Unity Garden noting that God’s human garden has a variety of colorful persons as does his vegetation red, brown, black, yellow and white. With the produce, donations were made to area free food giveaway outlets to the community and made available to the fan residents. The neighbors greatly appreciated and accepted the garden also for their use for their families.
The church has provided office space to the Black Lives Matter group of Richmond for them to have a food and clothing pantry and meeting space going on now.
Help is needed now.
As a monthly partner or one time gift all contributions are tax deductible.
Thank you in advance,
Dr. David Wright, MD, MAR, MDIV
Community Church of God in Christ
1801 Park Ave
Richmond VA 23220
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