Christmas is approaching, the first that many African Americans will experience in freedom. Yet Christmas, of pagan origins and still considered popish or pagan by most Baptists, is not yet celebrated in Baptist churches, North or South, black or white. One church in Richmond, Virginia, however, will be celebrating an entirely different occasion on Christmas…
Many Baptist churches of the South yet lie in ruins or at least disrepair, a byproduct of the recent war, perhaps none more so than in the state of Virginia. Today’s Richmond Daily Dispatch carries an article about one such church. “The Rev. Mr. Taylor, a native of Richmond, and pastor of the Baptist Church…
The African American Second Baptist Church of Hampton, Virginia was established in the months following the end of the Civil War. This week the congregation makes preparations for a celebration of January 1, 1866, the third anniversary of the Emancipation Proclamation, and the first since the effecting of freedom for all blacks with the Union…