"There's no place like home(s)..."

news for the season of watching, waiting, beginning anew

Greetings for this peace-week of Advent — in all secular and faith-inspired meanings of the word.

Significant newsmakers and issues in recent newShrink focus (left and right columns above) are coinciding in eerie precision with current transitions and priority concerns on the personal front (center).

Those who lean even a little Jungian might call it synchronistic.

connecting dots & title themes

Both of today’s news subjects in Charlotte illuminate one growing urban community’s multiple-partner solutions to a problem that has reached crisis proportions nationwide. Affordable housing is a tenaciously thorny symptom in the very cities — like Charlotte — that are America’s current success stories: Exponential growth, prosperity (for the prosperous), gentrification of vanishing working-class neighborhoods…

One a pioneering Presbyterian Church and the other a dynamic Habitat for Humanity affiliate, each has core identity and mission grounded in Christian traditions of inclusivity/welcome of the stranger, and social- and economic-justice. The featured Caldwell Presbyterian Church serves those in need of basic housing before all other needs can be addressed, a shelter first approach. And since 1983 Habitat for Humanity affiliates partner with people who have low-to-moderate-income to enable them to build and pay with assistance for what is identified today as much-needed workforce housing.

Nationwide, meanwhile, attendance, membership, giving and participation have been declining over the past decade or more, at Christian churches — also at other faiths’ houses of worship — that do not buy into prosperity-gospel Christianity or the megachurch evangelical movement. For many of them, once-packed buildings and unused real estate are in decline — yet can potentially serve both dire community need and the church’s basic need for sustainability (a need shared by every institution.)

On a personal level, affordable housing — particularly in Charlotte — has long been a passion and concern. (I’ve come to understand that it even spans a couple of generations of my Charlotte-native family.) Over the years I’ve served on the boards of both Charlotte and Lake Norman/Our (4) Towns Habitat affiliates, and more recently in family selection and financial education (aligning with my work as a therapist.) With more time, energy and less family responsibility I’m now plugging back into these areas. I plan to be volunteering in some capacities at Caldwell, too. I’ll be writing soon about my third volunteer passion in these concerning times: new-voter registration via the League of Women Voters — at/immediately after the swearing in ceremonies for newly naturalized citizens, who have undergone the unbelievably rigorous, years-long process of becoming U.S. citizens.

My intensified current regard for faith organizations that are grounded in a mission of inclusivity, social and economic justice is similarly antidote or counterpoint. I have grave concern about increasingly vocal, strident Christian-Nationalist rhetoric and far-right evangelical dominance of public conversation and policy-making in Trumpian America. We are not, have never been, a theocracy.

The fact this needs to be pointed out, even argued as good and necessary, has me convinced it’s an important time to find and be visibly, vocally supporting one or more of the many faith- and mission-grounded organizations demonstrating how that works, and what it means in practice.

One note of disclosure regarding both Caldwell Church and its former-journalist/current author-pastor, John Cleghorn, and two of the gifted journalists, Jim Morrill and Tim Funk, whose well-reported-and-written pieces are here. All three are also my former Charlotte Observer-reporter colleagues (Jim and Tim far more recently still journalists.) Cleghorn and I have been on past paths that were oddly, though not closely, parallel, from newspaper journalists to long-time bank corporate communicators (he at the different, “other” big Charlotte bank.) Then his later call to his wonderful ministry was around the same time I began my Jungian and depth psychology studies.

With all of this in mind, as limited space allows I’m sharing directly from their work or quoted comments. (Even basic material on the Caldwell Presbyterian website reflects Cleghorn’s keen sense of story, historic threads and intersecting themes.) I highly recommend reading full links here, for I can’t possibly improve on these guys, and excerpting can be fragmented!

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brick by brick

Charlotte church aims to lead charge to reduce homelessness (Spectrum News, link includes video and text version)

The Brick by Brick affordable housing summit drew more than 100 participants from 60 churches on Saturday, November 25, at Caldwell Presbyterian Church at 1609 E. Fifth St. in Charlotte.

Here is Jim Morrill’s superb piece published the same weekend, from Charlotte Magazine. Jim first provides excellent context and factual trend numbers on the affordable housing — and the church — crises at the Charlotte regional and national levels. This story describes the earlier, even larger symposium in Charlotte in the spring.

“Charlotte Looks to Churches’ Land to Address the Housing Crisis” (Charlotte Magazine, November 24, 2024)

Cities needing space for affordable housing are turning to the precious land owned by churches

A summit in Charlotte last spring drew more than 100 churches interested in tackling the city’s affordable housing deficit, now at 36,000.

Two decades ago, Gallup found an average of 42% of U.S. adults attended religious services every week or almost every week. Now it’s 30%, a loss that COVID accelerated for some churches. Like Newell Presbyterian locally, many have seen their revenues shrink along with their congregations.

“We’re all sitting on … campuses built for the height of Christendom,” says Cleghorn. “Some churches in the near future will be talking about legacy as they consider how much longer it will be before they have to close their doors.”(The Rev. John Cleghorn, sr. pastor)

For churches like Newell, what started as a potential lifeline turned into a new mission. “If we have started this trying to avoid death, we have found new life and meaning and hope and clarity of vision and mission in the process,” [its pastor] Conner says. “That’s been a really transformative thing for us as a congregation. If it started as just trying to avoid dying, we’ve found a new sense of life in the process.”

In his book, Cleghorn writes that “the local church … stands at the convergence of its own existential crisis, a national cry for community, and a housing crisis that, directly or indirectly, shapes every American neighborhood.”

A current Caldwell Church member, who experienced homelessness herself and speaks from that viewpoint: “This is going to give them stability and a brand-new lease on life."

Church building to be transformed into housing for people experiencing homelessness (Charlotte ABC News affiliate WSOC TV)

Here is where the Caldwell project — and Cleghorn in telling the story — comes to life as the legacy of a young girl enslaved by the Caldwell family for whom the church was named.

Easter’s Home: Where We Are (and Moved to Be)

(From the church website)

About Caldwell

Founded in 1912 amid one of Charlotte’s many growth booms, Caldwell Presbyterian grew in membership and stature through about 1960, when membership numbered 1,100. It then entered a decades-long decline, driven in part by suburban sprawl and neighborhood changes. By 2006, members had voted to close the church due to dwindling funds. However, God had a different idea. An unaffiliated group of seekers that had been renting a room at Caldwell for weekly fellowship and study joined with the dozen remaining members of the church to renew and redirect the church toward a more missional, inclusive and justice-centered expression of faith.

Here is veteran journalist Tim Funk’s interesting 2021 guest-column interview with John Cleghorn.

Resurrecting a church: How one Charlotte pastor may have found the future of worship (The Charlotte Observer, March 2021)

John Cleghorn is a straight white male leading a thriving and unusually diverse church once on the brink of extinction. He has a book out about the church. [this was his earlier book. The current one just out is about projects such as Easter’s Home.]

In its heyday in the 1950s, Caldwell Presbyterian in Charlotte was a neighborhood church with a congregation of about 1,200 people — including the Belk family of department store fame.

But by 2006, Caldwell was down to 12 members, all of them in their twilight years, and the church was scheduled to close.

Then a different-looking group that once worshiped together at [vibrant, largely Black] Seigle Avenue Presbyterian — which Caldwell had helped start decades earlier — joined with the aged Caldwell remnant to resurrect the church on Fifth Street in Elizabeth.

Soon, Caldwell started filling with people and with a vibrant Gospel choir.

[As of this March 2021 piece], the church has[d] a “community of faith” of about 350. But what makes it unique in Charlotte is its great diversity — in membership and worship style. The multi-racial flock, which is also about 20% LGBTQ, drives to Caldwell every Sunday from 26 ZIP codes in four counties and two states.

It’s still Presbyterian, but only about half its members grew up in that denomination. They’re joined by ex-Methodists, ex-Baptists, ex-Catholics and ex-non-churchgoers.

The Rev. John Cleghorn, [then 59], wrote a book about the church he had pastored for 13 years by 2021. It’s called “Resurrecting Church: Where Justice and Diversity Meet Radical Welcome and Healing Hope”…

Here is more about Caldwell, including candid factual details from its historic origins with its namesake, the prominent Caldwell family of landowners who owned slaves. (Again, from the church’s website.

In 1922, what began as John Knox Presbyterian received a substantial sum of money left to the church by the last remaining member of the Caldwell family, Sallie Caldwell White. Her father, David Caldwell, had been the final owner of the family’s plantation in northern Mecklenburg that had enslaved a number of Black families and individuals stolen from Africa. The church honored the gift by changing its name to Caldwell Memorial Presbyterian.

Here is a slideshow with more information about the Caldwell Family.

A woman named Easter was among those the Caldwells enslaved, according to David Caldwell’s will. Easter’s Home is meant to bring visibility to her life and others enslaved by the Caldwells and to symbolize God’s Easter promise of grace, renewal, resurrection and reconciliation.

(The black and white photo above depicts the Caldwell family home.)

Easter’s Home at Caldwell and its various community supporters and partners focus on the enormous housing first need for the many who are without homes or adequate shelter.

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workforce housing

Habitat for Humanity provides affordable to those with low-to-moderate-income, often understood in today’s world as essential workforce housing. In case you’re mostly unfamiliar with Habitat on national, international or local/regional scales, or its it’s been awhile since you’ve thought about it, first here’s a little recap on how it works.

Established in Americus, GA, in 1983 by Millard and Linda Fuller, Habitat was founded on the principle of partnership with shared labor and investment by those needing a first step into permanent homeownership. By the mid-’80s former President Jimmy Carter and former First Lady Rosalynn had centered much of their national and worldwide mission work on building Habitat for Humanity.

In 2022, MacKenzie Scott (prominent philanthropist divorced from Amazon billionaire Jeff Besos) donated $436 million to 84 Habitat for Humanity affiliates nationwide. The state purpose was to increase supply of affordable housing, prioritize advocacy and promotion efforts and revitalize underinvested communities. Forbes noted that the Habitat sum was the largest of Scott’s total gifts of $16.5 billion from her fortune after divorcing Bezos.

In Charlotte the Scott contribution has made possible a significantly expanded, multipurpose warehouse facility that not only stocks, stores and organizes just-in-time building supplies for Habitat home. There’s now also well-appointed, indoor component-construction space, where whole wall units, sections of roof- and floor-supports and other necessary basics can be produced in a central, climate-controlled location. Equally or more important, volunteer builders now can learn skills and get quality oversight from highly experienced Habitat builders.

(Pictured here), a tour of the remarkable facility was part of an information-and-refreshments event I attended there last week, with other current and former board members of Charlotte and regional Habitat affiliates. Meeting spaces are pleasant and accessible, but the big wow is the warehouse. Imagine you’re in Lowe’s, Home Depot or most any hardware store — even if you don’t enjoy them as I do (it’s admittedly a quirky-acquired pleasure.) Only this one’s super-organized, clean, well-lit and the shelves are stocked by visible logic. And then, about a fourth of the far-end space, even better-lit, is like a giant shop-classroom for teaching and building components. There are whole wall sections on display, large work tables with tools and models for volunteers to follow. Another big plus is the facility’s location, from uptown just north of the thriving Camp North End destination complex for dining of all sorts and creative pursuits. Yet the industrial park-site is also just on the city side of ready access to both major interstates, 77 and 85.

To Charlotte Regional Habitat, the MacKenzie Scott funds have also brought: expansion into creating entire neighborhoods with mixed kinds of homes including multifamily; partnership with other developers on projects in which low-to-moderate-income housing is mingled transparently with other sizes, types and price ranges; expansion of the Critical Home Repair program to keep aging homes livable, enabling long-time homeowners in gentrifying areas to stay in their homes; expanding the scope of Charlotte Habitat services by merging with Habitat affiliates serving three counties and more than a half-dozen additional towns in the region.

Here’s a sampling of recent news coverage.

AFFORDABLE HOUSING CRISIS

2 nonprofits join forces to tackle the Charlotte area housing crisis

Habitat for Humanity of the Charlotte Region and Habitat for Humanity of Gaston County are merging.

Charlotte-area Habitat for Humanity affiliates merge Oct. 1 (WCNC.com)

[from the Habitat news release]

Big changes are on the horizon for two Charlotte-area Habitat for Humanity affiliates. Habitat for Humanity of the Charlotte Region and Habitat Gaston County announced this week that the two will merge in October and operate as Habitat Charlotte Region.

Combining talents and resources allows the affiliates to provide more families with affordable housing, Habitat Charlotte Region CEO Laura Belcher said in a statement.

“The cost of housing in the greater Charlotte area continues to outpace many working families’ ability to purchase homes,” Belcher said. “By consolidating our organizations and combining efforts, we expect to serve more of those families together, more quickly than our two affiliates could serve if we continued to operate independently.”

The merger will bring more programs to serve local residents, including critical home repairs to help preserve existing affordable housing and new financial education programing, officials said. The new organization will serve low-to moderate-income homebuyers and homeowners in Gaston, Iredell and Mecklenburg counties.

Habitat Gaston County board Chairman Patrick Mumford noted that more than a third of the Gaston County population is cost burdened, which means they spend more than 30% of their monthly income on housing. The same is true for Mecklenburg County where 32% of households are cost burdened, according to the N.C. Housing Coalition. Throughout North Carolina, 28% of households fall into this category.

“We have several families who have already been approved for new home ownership and many more who have requested critical repairs to homes they own,” Mumford said. “Combining our talent and resources will enable us to provide services to those families in an accelerated time frame.”

Since 1983, the two affiliates have served more than 4,800 families. The new organizations serves families from Charlotte to Gastonia and Pineville to Statesville.

After merger, the new affiliate will have assets of nearly $69 million, revenues of more than $52 million and nearly 1,100 mortgages.

Habitat Charlotte Region continues to be headquartered in Charlotte, with offices in Gastonia and Davidson, and it plans to operate seven ReStores in Charlotte, Cornelius, Gastonia, Mooresville, Pineville, and Statesville.

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Shifting now to the more personal, transition is under way with now straddling life between suburban lake and part-time condo in Charlotte.

The sequence of photos below culminates in what I’ll call my Sarah Palin-moment. (Younger readers might Google the 2008 presidential campaign, in which then-Alaska Gov. Palin was widely/wildly quotable as presidential candidate John McCain’s running mate for VP.)

For labs Hazel, Jesse and me, last week was the first several-days, midweek stay at the condo, as I had different volunteer-work shifts coinciding with the board event and other visits. With spouse John away at a several-day business conference, this meant a lot of city dog-walks (at all hours!) — so exciting for these e-collared pups who are used to near free-range coming and going “out in the country.”

Truly, I, too, am like an exchange student from another land, newly re-discovering my hometown after living a 30-year, 35-mile commute away. There’s a kind of falling-in-love: Siren sounds! People out walking dogs! Just people, period! Train whistles late in the night! And then there are the chance encounters, just out on a walk or taking a short-cut in the car: With a long-ago neighbor of my mom’s. Grade-school classmate. My would-be godson outside with his toddler. My far-dearer-than-a-work-colleague-friend Laurie, forever loved, too seldom-seen.

In the Christmas tree lot photos, starting at left below, the dogs and I’d found our way to Simpson’s. I was amazed to see tags still saying “Simpson’s,” since something like 1941. I think my parents probably got their first, and our family holiday trees there. And for me a Simpson’s tree was Christmas ritual, from my first-single-adult apartment, then first house in nearby Elizabeth, and so on… until moving “north” to Lake Norman nearly 30 years ago. (By totally unrelated happenstance, if memory serves, son and daughter-in-law’s “official” 2013 engagement with ring centered around their tree just purchased at Simpson’s.)

On last week’s visit, as pictured I was delighted to find such selection of good table-top trees, not just for condo but a preferred touch for multiple rooms or spaces vs giant tree.

Then I happened to look up, catching a glimpse [at far left behind the utility lines] of the familiar vintage juke-box shape of the former First Union center-city headquarters (in recent years Wells Fargo). My corporate communications office, for the longest time of my banking career, was on the 27th floor. From our earlier offices on the 29th floor of the older headquarters building across the street, it had been part of my job to manage communications for development of the adjoining plaza and atrium complex, along with each phase of the rising pink-granite skyscraper.

That concluded with having to escort journalists, all of us in hard hats, up the rickety construction elevator. This was for the weird medieval tradition of “topping-out” the still wall-less structure, by placing a tree and holding a ceremony up there.

Heading back to the condo, and then that Sarah Palin moment…

“I can see First Union from my house!!”

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For today’s closing note, a few days ago this unlikely story grabbed and kept delighting me — apropos of absolutely nothing obvious I could think of, except a great relief from politics, horrific crime news and turbulently falling foreign regimes.:

World's oldest known wild bird lays an egg at 74

… talk about “beginning anew.” Egad.

She is an albatross, whose name is Wisdom…

(Well, of course it is.)

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And, that is all I have for now!

🦋💙 tish

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… it is important that awake people be awake,
or a breaking line may discourage them back to sleep;
the signals we give — yes or no, or maybe —
should be clear: the darkness around us is deep.
— William Stafford, “A Ritual to Read to Each Other”

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