The National Baptist Congress of Christian Education held its 108th Annual Session June 16-21 at America’s Center in Downtown St. Louis.
The Congress serves as the primary training arm of the National Baptist Convention, USA, Inc., the nation’s oldest and largest African-American religious group with an estimated membership of 7.5 million.
According to the Rev. Sammie E. Jones, senior pastor of Mount Zion Baptist Church-Christian Complex, St. Louis is the first city to host back-to-back sessions of the Congress.
As local host committee chairman and 2nd vice president of the Congress who oversees nine states in the Midwest Region, Jones was instrumental in making this happen.
He was joined by local host committee co-chairs the Rev. Jimmy Brown, pastor of St. Luke Missionary Baptist Church-St. Louis, and the Rev. Zachary Lee, pastor of Mount Paran Missionary Baptist Church–East St. Louis. They worked with the St. Louis Convention & Visitors Commission (CVC) and local churches on both sides of the Mississippi to host the event, which Jones described as “a mammoth task which caused us to pray and pray hard.”
Although the theme for this year’s session was “Solidarity with the Savior,” the local host committee came up with its own. “Let’s do it again, only better,” Jones said of organizing the event.
According to the CVC, the 30,000-plus people who attended the convention generated an estimated $20.4 million for the local economy, a substantial increase from last year’s $17.4 million.
Last May, Jones rallied for the support of every pastor in the region to come out and support the Congress. It seems as if his plea was answered, because Missouri ranked 9th among the states with the highest number of registered churches and delegates, according to Jones.
The sessions featured three high-profile keynote speakers, including two senior U.S. Department of Education officials from the Obama administration. Brenda Girton-Mitchell, director of the Center for Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships, and David Johns, executive director of the newly-formed White House Initiative on Educational Excellence for African-Americans, both made brief remarks before the Dean’s Address on June 18. The Rev. Elliott Cuff, pastor of Lincoln Heights Missionary Baptist Church in Woodlawn, Ohio, serves as Congress Dean.
Roland Martin, award-winning journalist and commentator, gave a rousing speech at the President and Educational Scholarship Banquet on June 19. Drawing inspiration from the 50th anniversary of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s “Letter from a Birmingham Jail,” Martin addressed the current state of education in our country and its negative impact on African-American youth.
He reminded the audience that next year the country will celebrate the 60th anniversary of the 1954 Brown v. Board of Education decision, but the African-American community is still battling many of the same problems faced by the courageous youth and their families who desegregated public education.
“We are still waiting on a system to change when it comes to educating our children,” he said. “How is it that we are still waiting on a system that never wanted to educate us in the first place?”
The next generation of African-American and Hispanic youth will not be equipped to take advantage of two-thirds of available jobs, he said. He said that at the root of the problem are “sorry teachers, administrators, school boards, politicians and even parents” who need to be called out.
“Every day that we are waiting on elected officials or a teachers’ union, our kids are falling farther and farther behind,” Martin said.
He said that churches can be used to fundamentally alter national education systems, like seeking out retired school teachers within a congregation to help develop after-school tutoring programs.
The 109th Annual Session of the National Baptist Congress of Christian Education will be held in Dallas, Texas next year.
