wfn.org | Methodist church draws Wall Street area to worship

[NewsDesk <NewsDesk@UMCOM.ORG>]

Sept. 20, 2001 News media contact: Linda Bloom7(212) 870-38037New York
10-21-71B{414}

NOTE: This report is accompanied by a sidebar, UMNS story #415.

By Linda Bloom*

NEW YORK (UMNS) - It wasn't the usual crowd, but participants at the Sept.
19 "Wonderful Wall Street Wednesday" service at John Street United Methodist
Church were vocal in their praise and enthusiasm.

"Welcome back!" exclaimed the Rev. James McGraw, pastor of the small church
just a few blocks from "ground zero" of the World Trade Center tragedy. "In
trial and tribulation, in fire and terror, the oldest continuous Methodist
society in America still stands." The congregation was founded in 1766.

The Rev. Suzan Johnson Cook, senior pastor of the Bronx Christian Fellowship
Church, a co-sponsor of the lunchtime ministry, acknowledged the
difficulties everyone had experienced, but declared, "We're not going to let
this be a ghost town, we're going to let this be a Holy Spirit town."

Under normal circumstances, the Wonderful Wall Street Wednesday service
draws 400 or more people from the area. They crowd into the sanctuary, which
is lined with stone tablets commemorating individual Methodists, for prayer,
praise singing and a short sermon by one of the two pastors or a guest
preacher. Some regulars have formed the New Millennium Choir, which
rehearses every Monday and sings at the service twice a month.

After a summer hiatus, the Wednesday services had been scheduled to start
again on Sept. 12, the day after terrorists brought down the twin towers.
But that day, with the area cordoned off to all but rescue workers, McGraw
sat in the building alone.

A week later, however, he joyfully shook hands with those who came to the
door to worship. In total, an estimated 150 to 200 participants arrived.

"We know that many of you are shaken, and we want to go on with our
spiritual and physical lives," Cook told the congregation before they
started singing the hymn "This Little Light of Mine."

The Rev. Calvin Butts, a prominent New York clergy leader and senior pastor
of Abyssinian Baptist Church in Harlem, was guest preacher. He mentioned
that he had met with President Bush the day before in the White House Rose
Garden.

Citing such events as the assassination of President Kennedy, the Cuban
missile crisis and the bombing of Pearl Harbor, Butts reminded the group
that America is no stranger to tragedy. "It's simply the enormity, the size
of what's happened," that makes everything seem worse, he said.

While America will be mournful and sad, he said, "We will, as a nation and
as individuals, get through it. The way that we will get through it is
learning to manage our fear."

The firefighters who rushed to save people in the World Trade Center towers,
for example, managed their fear out of motivation to help fellow citizens.

"If we don't manage our fear, the terrorists have won," Butts said. "If I
don't fly, ride the subway or go over bridges, they've won."

People, not buildings, are the pillars of strength for America, the pastor
pointed out. "When you go back to work," he told those gathered at John
Street, "you be the tower. You stand tall."

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*Bloom is news director of United Methodist News Service's New York office.

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United Methodist News Service
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