Funding Effort Yields $150,000 for Burned Church
A crowdfunding effort has raised more than $150,000 in a single day to help repair a historic black church that was burned in what appeared to be a politically charged arson attack in Mississippi on Tuesday.
The GoFundMe campaign, launched on Wednesday by Blair Reeves, a New York City-based tech product manager, received more than 4,500 pledged donations in less than 24 hours. Reeves had hoped to raise $10,000.
Reeves wrote in a status update late Wednesday saying, “When I ginned up this page before my first meeting at work today, I had no earthly clue it would get so big. Thank you all so much.”
The burning of the 111-year-old Hopewell Missionary Baptist Church in Greenville, Miss., is being investigated by local, state and federal law enforcement agencies, including the FBI and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms.
The FBI has opened a civil rights investigation of the Tuesday night fire, and Greenville fire officials told the Associated Press they have determined it was arson.
“Vote Trump” was spray-painted on the outside of the church.
“This is a hate crime,” Greenville Mayor Errick Simmons told Yahoo News on Wednesday. “It’s a place where people raise their children, it’s a meeting place for the exchange of ideas, so we know the symbolism of the burning of the black church in the ’50s and ’60s was a way to intimidate folks who had their rights and civil liberties deprived. We’re looking at this as a hate crime, given the historic nature of this church.”
“Love trumps hate,” added Simmons, who took office in January. “And what we have to do is move forward in loving each other and respecting each other.”
(Source: Yahoo News)
