Foundation Of Faith City’s Oldest Black Church Marks 105th Anniversary

Every Sunday, as Pauline and Sylvester Lake walk through the doors of Calvary Baptist Church, 52 years of images come alive.

Their two daughters are perched on wooden pews, dressed in their Easter finest. Or they prance through the sanctuary as part of the Christmas Pageant.

The girls don choir robes to sing, read scripture or play piano.

In a rush of memories, Sylvester Lake is walking his girls down the aisle.

They held a funeral for one of those daughters.

Sunday, they watched proudly as their other daughter, Mona Lake Jones, gave a keynote address that was more sermon than speech, more poetry then prose.

Every monumental occasion in the Lake family has been marked at Calvary Baptist at Third and Cowley.

Just as the church has been there for the Lakes over the last half-century, the Lakes have been there for church. They were there Sunday to celebrate the 105th anniversary of Spokane’s oldest black church.

In between the big events were little ones, Pauline Lake said: chicken dinners, church picnics, anniversaries, bake sales and dund-raisers.< “I wanted my children to come up like I did,” she said. “In the atmosphere of something I thought would be indelible in their minds as they grew.”

Jones’ testimony on Sunday endorsed the church as the place for families, particularly black families.

“We know that being the parent of a black child, that that ain’t no easy thing,” she said. “We must call on God.”

Jones, a professor, a writer, a poet and nationally known speaker, said her upbringing is the reason behind her success.

“I not only had a mother and a father who cared about me, I had a church and a community that looked after me,” she said. “They demonstrated love for the sake of loving, because that is how God said loving should be.”

Calvary still is central in the lives of hundreds of families in Spokane, said the Rev. C.W. Andrews, pastor of the church.

“The family is the root, is the backbone, is the base of the church,” Andrews said. “God established a family.”

The congregation is predominantly black, but the church has no color, Andrews points out.

“When the blacks had no other places to go, the church was their social focus point,” said Emelda Brown, a 35-year member of Calvary. “They gathered here, they socialized here. So the church is their foundation, it’s their background on which they were built.”

Calvary Baptist was founded Feb. 16, 1890, by 11 black pioneers. The building on Third Avenue was completed in 1927.

In 105 years there have been cycles of feast and famine, Andrews said.

Pauline Lake can remember gathering in the basement with fewer than a dozen other worshippers. There was not enough money to heat the building.

Although in the early years the members of the congregation were mostly poor, the church built its sanctuary and later a parsonage with money from fund-raisers.

“Calvary has a lot of history and that’s fine,” said V. Anne Smith. “But you can have a lot of history and be like a museum. And Calvary is not a museum.”

The church remains a vital part of the community, she said. Although there are 18 black churches in Spokane, Calvary is the most symbolic, she said.

“We don’t mind the politicians coming in and hearing what they have to say,” she said. “They all come to Calvary, it’s the icon of the black community in Spokane.”

Like churches everywhere, Calvary is struggling to redefine itself, Andrews said. While there still are young families in the congregation, the older people are dying off faster than they can be replaced.

“We have to learn to adjust to changes,” he said. “If you are not reaching the people one way, you have to revamp some things.”

Longtime Calvary members like the Lakes and the Browns yearn for the days when the church was packed every Sunday with families.

“Where children used to attend church always, now that’s not so prevalent,” said Emelda Brown, who raised five children through Calvary. “But many of them have the background and will one day return to their roots of Christianity.”

In her speech, Jones talked about the upcoming challenge for Calvary.

“God has given us the kind of strength and endurance as black people that no other people have,” she said.

“Our children, and thereby our future, are endangered,” she said. “Our revival should always focus on children.”