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Need something? Just call First Baptist Church of Syracuse!
First Baptist Church of Syracuse, located in suburban Jamesville, NY.
Photo: First Baptist Church of Syracuse
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By Carol Fouke-Mpoyo, with contributions from Thomas Abraham
Need some pots and pans for newly arriving refugees? A van to pick them up at the airport, or to deliver some furniture to their apartment? How about a site for a meeting or a resettlement picnic?
The refugee resettlement community in Central New York State knows it can ask for what it needs from First Baptist Church of Syracuse in suburban Jamesville.
"I can call them anytime if we need something," said Betty Collins of the Refugee Resettlement Program, Interreligious Council of Central New York. "They're great! I use the church all the time for events. It's a big church with lots of land, and it's easy to entertain there."
A frequent refugee cosponsor over the years, First Baptist currently is focused on a multi-year primary school education and youth ministries project in Kamanzi, Kenya. The project grew out of the church's active engagement with Kenyan students at Syracuse University.
 Rev. Scott Kavanagh, pastor at First Baptist Church of Syracuse Photo: First Baptist Church of Syracuse
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But don't worry, this American Baptist congregation remains just a phone call away when there is a refugee-related need. "All of this is interconnected for us, to be in contact with people around the world," said Rev. Scott Kavanagh, the church's pastor.
First Baptist Church of Syracuse dates its involvement with refugee resettlement to 1946, when Rev. Dr. Edwin T. Dahlberg was pastor. Dahlberg is known internationally for his denominational and ecumenical leadership. He was president of the American Baptist Churches USA and National Council of Churches USA and served on the World Council of Churches Central Committee.
"Rev. Dahlberg was very social justice minded and really challenged the church after World War II ended," said Shirley Mills, 77, a life-long member of First Baptist active in the congregation's refugee resettlement work from the start, and a board member of Central New York's Refugee Resettlement Program for 17 years. "He said, 'Here are all these displaced persons in camps. Each church has to do something.'" In response, the church sponsored a three-person family from Latvia.
In the 1960s, the congregation resettled a Cuban refugee family. In the 1970s, it joined two other American Baptist churches to cosponsor a Hmong family. After relocating from downtown Syracuse to Jamesville in the late 1980s, it sponsored Kosovar, Vietnamese, and Haitian families.
"The Haitians had no English skills at all and lots of health issues," said Rev. Kavanagh. "They had lived in fear. They told us horrific stories. We are still in relationship with them."
Of particular pride: a daughter who recently graduated from a two-year college with financial support from the congregation, and a son, "a very bright young man," who did a complete turnaround after a difficult period when he got into fights and was kicked out of high school. The teen's parents sent him to Haiti for a year, where he lived with a relative and ran a restaurant. He came back to Syracuse, re-enrolled in high school and got two part-time jobs, one enforcing curfew at a mall.
"He also volunteered with the refugee agency's after-school program," Rev. Kavanagh said. "He has a great heart and tremendous potential. We love to support kids who are working hard. We let them know the church cares about them."
In 2001, First Baptist collaborated with the Community Church and St. Mary's Catholic Church in Jamesville and Pebble Hill Presbyterian Church in nearby DeWitt to cosponsor four Sudanese "Lost Boys." Each congregation took one of the young men under its wings in a special way, and two of the churches organized cooking classes for them.
"That was an interesting experiment," Shirley Mills said. "It was a comedy of errors the first couple of times, and then it worked out very, very well."
Collaborating with other churches is a great option for smaller congregations, said Mills. "In 1946, First Baptist had 1,800 members. Now we have between 200 and 300. What became hard to do as one church was successful as a cluster."
Parents of two daughters, Shirley, a former General Electric and school district employee, and her husband, John, who also worked for GE and "moved more furniture and other household goods for refugees than most people," Rev. Kavanagh reported, are matter-of-fact about their own long-time commitment to refugee resettlement.
"It's just the experience of one couple in one church who tried to help," Shirley said. She concluded, "I think that brings you up to date with what we've been doing in refugee resettlement for more than 50 years."
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