Black Virginia Church Contributes $1M For African Girls’ Scholarships

By Rosaland Tyler
Associate Editor
New Journal and Guide

Ghanaian girls will now receive scholarships totalling $1 million, thanks to a recent historic donation made at the annual Lott Carey meeting that ran from Aug. 12-15 in Memphis.

Alfred Street Baptist Church, a historic Black church in Alexandria, recently donated $1 million to support the ministry of the Ghana Baptist Convention, one of the largest denominations in Ghana, in an effort to rescue young girls from families that have sold them into indentured servitude. Previously, Alfred Street Baptist donated $1 million to the National Museum of African-American History and Culture in 2015 and donated the same amount to Jackson State University, a historically Black institution in Mississippi, to help students and officials as they dealt with a crisis in 2022 after high levels of lead were found in its water.

The Rev. Howard-John Wesley, who has pastored Alfred Street Baptist for nearly 20 years, said his church raised the money through a 40-day fast in 2023. Members and supporters declined favorite foods, drinks and habits and donated the money.

Wesley recently told Religion News that about 14,000 people gave up “wine, all caffeine, all sugar, all fried products,” he said, “and all spending from Amazon.”

Wesley, who is a rising star in Black Baptist circles, attracts hundreds of thousands to his weekly online sermons. He said his church “actually gave about $870,000 and the church leadership said that’s too close to a million not to raise a million,” so the church used its Tithe-the-Tithe Initiative, which gives 10 percent of weekly donations it receives to help community groups.”

Lott Carey donated its historic scholarship award to Ghanaian girls at its recent annual meeting in Memphis, where the Rev. Gina Stewart concluded her historic three-year tenure over the organization. In 2021, she became the first female president of the Black Baptist organization, Lott Carey. At the recent meeting, she installed her successor, the Rev. Jesse T. Williams Jr., the current first vice president and senior pastor of Convent Avenue Baptist Church in Harlem.

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A former slave, Lott Carey was born a slave in 1780 in Charles City County, Va. He  launched his global ministry in 1821. The organization continues to offer prayer, financial backing, and technical support to local communities worldwide.