"The building is gone but our church is still all around us."

The above is a quote of Sonya Stephens taken from a recent article

For Bibb County Church fires updates http://harpersmews.blogspot.com/ is the most local and level headed blogger that I have found on the subject.

Update: February 5, 2006

Taken from an article by Ryan Mills in this morning's Birmingham News

• Antioch Baptist Church received little dammage. The congregation will worship in the church at its usual times.
• Ashby Baptist Church will worship at 9 a.m. at Shady Grove Baptist Church, on Alabama 139 about five miles south of Ashby church.
• New Harmony Baptist Church received no damage to its sanctuary. The congregation will worship at its usual times.
• Old Union Baptist Church received little damage. The congregation will worship at 11 a.m. as usual in the church.
• Pleasant Sabine Baptist Church will have services beginning at 9:45 a.m. at Genesis Inc., 4626 Deer Creek Road.
• Rehobeth Baptist Church will hold Sunday School at 10 a.m. and morning worship at 11 a.m. in its Fellowship Hall, a metal building just across the parking lot from the santuary.

Sonya Stephens words bear repeating, "The building is gone but our church is still all around us."

Update: February 6, 2006

local coverage from Tuscaloosa News

CENTREVILLE, Ala. - In stories Feb. 3 and Feb. 4 on a cluster of church fires in Alabama, The Associated Press reported that race was a factor in a series of arsons that damaged rural black churches in that state and others in 1996. The story should have specified that race was found to be the motivation in a relatively small number of arson cases during a period in the mid-1990s in which arson increased at both black and white churches.

By Jay Reeves / Associated Press February 6, 2006 ..."The Rev. Jim Weed of Shady Grove Baptist Church, where the Ashby congregation met, said members of his church have kept a closer eye on their building since the church fires." .. (Not a bad idea)

Church faithful `begin again' (anyone surprised by that?)