The congregation that lost a church but found forgiveness,
“As soon as the fire broke through the roof, we just held each other and cried. It was a big ordeal. I’ll never forget that morning.” MARK DESOUSA CHURCH WARDEN AT THE TIME OF THE FIRE
As he sits inside All Saints’ Anglican Church in Whitby, Roy Allam still gazes in amazement at how the building has been transformed since a devastating fire in 2009.
Allam feels those emotions welling up around the Christmas season, because that’s when a deliberately set fire caused about $5 million in damage eight years ago.
The fire blew huge holes in the ceiling, including above the altar where flames tore through the roof.
But the holes have long since been covered, the portion over the altar now featuring beautiful painted images of chalices and other symbols of worship.
Huge stained-glass windows high above at the north and south ends of the church, smashed to bits by the flames and surging water from hoses, have also been replaced, as were the pews, organ, beams, flooring and other features.
“Now I come in on Sundays, sit in a pew and look up at the ceiling and windows and say ‘wow,’ ” says Allam, an attendee since 1989 and a church warden, whose responsibilities include the operation of All Saints’ and its finances.
The story of the fire involves an unsolved crime, forgiveness and the power of the congregation and community to rebuild from ashes. The blaze on Dec. 14, 2009, broke out in the downtown Whitby church around 5 a.m. on a frigid Monday. The inferno was so fierce that the resources of fire crews from Ajax, Whitby and Oshawa were needed. They doused the flames for about five hours.
Mark deSousa, 60, a church warden at the time, was one of the first members to get a phone call that morning. He threw on his coat and made the five-minute drive from his home to the church, at the corner of Centre St. and Dundas St. W.
DeSousa and Rev. Ken Davis, the head pastor at the time, could do nothing more than stare in disbelief at the flames and billowing smoke.
“As soon as the fire broke through the roof, we just held each other and cried,” deSousa says. “It was a big ordeal. I’ll never forget that morning.”
The flames started in the organ room after someone smashed a window, poured gasoline inside and lit it. A gas can was found on the ground outside the building.
Firefighters at one point worried the steeple might collapse, but the crews managed to save the structure of the building.
Damage was extensive, beyond just where the congregation worships. Water and smoke damaged the adjoining parish hall wing and church offices. Christmas hampers in the parish hall containing donated food, clothing and gifts for100 families were ruined by smoke and had to be tossed, recalls Allam, 58.
Members replaced the hampers, and the broader community donated $28,000 — money that All Saints’ used to supplement the annual Christmas hamper program until 2015. (Church members continue to fund the food component of the program today.)
The fire left the congregation of about 200 with no place to worship.
A local church, St. Andrew’s Presbyterian, invited the group to share space in their building on Cochrane St., about a kilometre away. The arrangement lasted 16 months.
In the meantime, reconstruction began at All Saints’ in the spring of 2010 after the building was stabilized.
Allam and All Saints’ new interim pastor, Rev. Jeannie Loughrey, oversaw the rebuild.
An army of experts was called in, including a general contractor, insurance adjusters, an engineering firm, architect, electrical contractors, window specialists, craftsmen who reproduced the pews and an artist who designed the ceilings above the altar using large stencils.
Today, the only signs of the fire are the smoke stains on the large stone font used during baptisms.
The $5-million rebuild has the 151-yearold church looking the same as it did before the blaze, only better, Allam insists.
He jokes that All Saints’ became the “poster boy” that other churches point to regarding the benefits of a good insurance policy. (The church had $5.8 million in insurance coverage before the fire. All Saints suffered an earlier, mysterious fire in August 1927. Insurance covered the roughly $10,000 in damage.)
When he began at the church in January 2013, Archdeacon Stephen Vail says members of the congregation told him they wanted All Saints’ to be known as more than just “the church that burned.”
It appears they got their wish, given the successful rebuild.
But as things stand, Durham Region police still don’t have a culprit.
In October 2011, a Pickering man was charged with arson-related offences, but those charges were dropped two months later after prosecutors determined that based on available evidence there was “no reasonable prospect of a conviction.”
Whoever is responsible for setting the fire, Roy Allam says he and others in the church forgive that person.
“I’m not going to pretend to know what was on the person’s mind,” he says. “I hope the person has found peace in their life.”
Like the peace of mind Allam and his fellow parishioners feel sitting in the pews.