Church reborn with brotherly love
A lower city congregation is breathing new life into Eucharist Church, a mega fixer-upper
The pastor of Eucharist Church fittingly describes his flock as “creative.”
So while other old churches are being torn down for development, this congregation is bucking the trend by breathing new life into a mega fixer-upper.
“We do unusual things,” said Pastor Kevin Makins.
His inter-denominational faith community
was, until last month, renting space in other buildings and churches.
But on March 1, it bought the First Romanian Baptist Church at 130 Victoria Ave. N. and has been busy reclaiming the crumbling 1893 building ever since.
Despite the big restoration still having a way to go, Eucharist Church held services in it for the first time on Easter weekend, starting on Good Friday with a wake — or funeral — for Jesus in the newly-repaired hall behind the sanctuary.
Congregants, dressed in black, were invited to
participate in what boiled down to a theatrical performance, with each person invited to speak on how it felt to lose their best friend Jesus.
“The community is creative,” said Makins.
Avant-garde in fact, and so much so, that the church hired Pastor Jill Trites “to bring structure to our overly creative church,” Makins said with a laugh.
On Easter, a rowdy, joyous and informal celebration among members and invited guests took place in a sanctuary with pews so packed, it was standing-room only.
This, despite several enormous windows still boarded up — three of them, 30-feet high — where the stained glass was removed two days earlier for restoration.
Makins joked to the 350 people at the service that “the power might go out and the toilets can back up — we don’t know what could go wrong,” but he promised a fun time.
So casual was the 3:30 p.m. service (Sunday service is in the afternoons so people can sleep in), that attendees were invited to take their unfinished coffee and desserts from the earlier social gathering into the sanctuary for the service.
This is no ordinary congregation or faith community. It is predominantly young, with an age demographic of mostly 18 to 35 years old, and there are plenty of toddlers running around.
“There are seven of us over 50,” said Trites.
But it’s not about age. The priority of Eucharist Church is to see matters differently, like through the eyes of justice for
example.
“We’re very interested in the intersection of faith, justice and the arts. So we do things that try to mix those interests,” Trites said.
Eucharist Church was founded by Makins, 31, and a small group in 2010. Although inter-denominational — with what Makins says is “a real group of mutts from all backgrounds” — it is affiliated with the Canadian Baptist Association of Churches.
Part of Eucharist Church’s interest in the First Romanian Church building was to have a place of its own in the heart of the city, said Makins.
“We really want this to serve the lower city of Hamilton, not just our own congregation.”
The building, which still has the First Romanian Baptist Church sign on its outside front
wall, was previously Victoria Baptist Church until the 1980s.
First Romanian, despite having sold the building, uses the church rent free on Sunday evenings for its 10 congregants still left, thanks to Eucharist Church.
Some of the funds used to buy the old church came from crowdsourcing, said Makins. Eucharist Church had a charity page through which it raised $50,000, and then a donor matched it with another $50,000.
The congregation chipped in to replace chunks of plaster that had fallen from the ceilings and walls, fix windows and radiators, and are doing a lot of painting.
Since the church still needs another $400,000 to get up to standard, having Easter services was “a soft launch” said Makins.
“It’s been a lot of work,” said Claire Peace, one of Eucharist
Church’s 130 core members. She was there to contribute to the cleanup multiple times after work, sanding and filling “a lot of holes” in the walls, before painting. Most recently, she scrubbed all the air duct vents and grates.
Peace, raised in the United Church, didn’t view the church building in its original state as the derelict piece of property it was.
“We thought it was beautiful. It does feel like a sacred place. It has pews, stained-glass windows ...,” she said.
“There were parts that were run down and needed a lot of love, but structurally, it’s in pretty good shape.”
Peace, 30, has been with Eucharist Church for five years after hearing about it from friends.
“I knew it was a group of people who cared a lot about the city. The group is all very different, but our common belief in God, and care for one another, and care for Hamilton, unites us,” she said.
“I’ve never been a part of a community like this. It’s beautiful.”
Member Oliver Veit, 32, loved the passion people in this congregation had, and how they wanted to connect with each other and with people outside the church.
“There’s a real strong sense of community here.”
As for the building, “I knew the space was beautiful and got people excited, but we hadn’t considered how much work it would be to get it functional.”
Cath Craig, 28, said it helped that the congregation had members with engineering experience.
“They determined pretty quick there was no major structural issue. The bones were good and that put me at ease.”
Craig, raised in the Canadian Reformed Church, said, “I’m blown away by the transformation, the amount of work people have done. I’m so impressed.”