A beloved Brownsville church is on the brink of being shuttered after the heartless parent Church organization leased out part of the three-lot monastery complex to a charter school, faithful parishioners say.
The Lutheran Church of the Risen Christ (LCRC), 250 Blake Avenue/257 Chester Street, has been a thriving Brownsville community staple for over 50 years. It is now locked in a grueling land and tenant battle in Kings County Civil Court, via skype, with the Westchester County-based Atlantic-District of the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod (AD-LCMS), leaving worshipers to pray to their lord and savior in the open air.
“What’s happening is disgraceful,” said Assemblymember Latrice Walker (D-Brownsville). “Risen Christ has been a staple in the community and produced some of the best gospel voices. I look forward to the complete restoration of the membership to the church.”
According to Risen Christ President Dorothy Barnes the holy battle to keep the church open dates back to 2018, when AD-LCMS entered into a lease agreement with the KEY Collegiate Charter School without the full consent of congregants.
The situation escalated a few months ago when AD-LCMS used the health pandemic as an opportunity to convert the sanctuary church portion of the complex into a charter school when parishioners were barred from worshipping together, she said.
Currently the church, that moved from storefront to tent to brick-and-mortar back in 1968, looks like its front half has fallen into disuse while the back half has been re-plastered and remodeled with green and white KEY Collegiate signage for a coming charter school in 2021.
Parishioners also allege that while renovations for the charter school were occurring for the charter school, the congregation’s belongings were thrown out of the building.
According to police, there are no complaint reports on file against the AD-LCMS for throwing out the belongings of the congregation during the pandemic, which Barnes acknowledges as true, since the responding sergeant hadn’t filled out paperwork at the time.
There is, however, overgrown shrubs and weeds in the front and the back lots of the building covering weather-worn tables, chairs, shelves, and other property Barnes identified as theirs.
Risen Christ Building Property Chair Alice Lowman, who has been with the church over 40 years and grew up in the community said she just wants the church to come back to where it should be, which is in the hand of the people and not the Atlantic-District.
“To take a church and do construction under the pretense of the pandemic, and not allow us back into our building. And while we were out under the governor’s orders to go in there and reconstruct the building to appear as if we were never in there is just wrong,” said Lowman.
According to Department of Buildings (DOB) records there have been seven complaints to stop construction on the property that were called in starting July 14, 2020. Additionally, an injunction order to stop construction is currently posted outside the front door on Blake Avenue, which according to appellate court documents, is dated July 13, 2020 and issued by the Honorable Sandra E. Roper initially.
The court documents also have a letter, dated April 17, 2020, in which AD-LCMS President and Bishop Derek Lecakes expresses regret he can’t inform the congregation face-to-face that the building will no longer be available to Risen Christ members because of a “strained and tense at times” relationship with their leadership.
He writes that the situation has become “untenable” and that Risen Christ has become “derelict” with their duties to the building, which is why they are exercising their rights as owners over the property.
When contacted by KCP, Lecakes refused to comment on the ongoing litigation.
“We refer you to the court filings by both parties, which are public record, including sworn affidavits, which refute the many baseless allegations being made by Ms. Dorothy Barnes, including evidence that this property has been owned by the District for over 60 years,” responded Lecakes.
No matter who holds the deed to the physical building, the grief that church members feel over not being allowed in to care for their church and worship is palpable.
“The money we raised, the money we put forth to make the church what it was when we left it in March and what it looks like now is appalling. No one could ever tell me that someone other than Risen Christ owned that church. We owned that church,” said Risen Christ Vice President Sharon Wallace.
These were people we trusted and believed in, said Wallace, about the ‘District’ as AD-LCMS is known. She said it’s not as if they never helped the church but they also came in and took everything away.
Several members even spoke highly of the District’s appointed bishops; Reverend Bernard J. Pankow, who helped build the church in 1968, and Reverend John Heinemeier, who helped set up the revered Nehemiah affordable housing project in the area.
But it is not the first altercation the AD-LCMS has had with local Brooklyn churches.
Bishop Donald Hudson of the former Hudson Temple Church of God in Christ/Common Ground Church, that used to be located at the cathedral on Covert Street between Bushwick Avenue and Broadway, offered his support to the Lutheran Risen Christ congregation.
Hudson said that in the early 2000s, after renting the property from 1991 to 1997, his family congregation also engaged in a land-tenant battle with AD-LCMS, but ultimately ended up selling the church in 2007.
Hudson said “the Synod” has very strong jurisdiction in Brooklyn, and when Hudson Temple was trying to buy their building, it came in and tried to out maneuver them as well.
While the litigants are due back in virtual court on July 29, the congregation continues to hold services, often in the front yard of the deacon’s home, where they also share food and laugh with one another, or online.
But the fellowship among congregants of all ages is tinged with sadness at what is happening to their beloved church.
“I feel bad because the devil has come in and taken what does not belong to them. That school was not approved by the congregation,” said Luella Perez-Fitzhugh, a member of Risen Christ since 1972.
Her son, Anthony Perez, a member since 1979, said, “The people that have it are nothing but robbers, it’s like they came in the thief of the night and took it and we can’t ask the police to do anything.”
Beyonca Brown Walker, 14, and her three younger sisters said that the church made them feel special and like they needed to be in this world.
“It made us come together. It made us feel comfortable,” said her mother, Larita Brown, “For us not to be there and not go every Sunday is hurtful.”
