Last building on BLOCK 5: Lost Heritage & Trust

BY HARVEY WINJE

Messiah Lutheran Evangelical Church Pastor, Dr. Rev. Leonard Kendall, (1943-1953) instilled is us students many tenets of Lutheranism and the Bible, but outstanding to me, 65 years later, is that we must always trust that the teacher, the leader, will always “have our back.”

Trust like that in church, government and institutional leaders has lessened and, in the case of Block 5 (e. 25^th St. to E. 26^th St and Chicago to Columbus), been completely LOST!

A decade ago Children”'s eliminated trust in institutions by Phillips Community as they disrespected and DEMOLISHED most of Block 5 and the trust of neighbors who had spent thousands of hours of their time negotiating a Land Use Covenant with local hospitals. It also damaged the trust of other neighbors including a large, local non-profit who sold multiple properties in disregard of neighborhood covenants.

“For this reason, as became brutally clear in 2004, our Twelve Block Agreement had near-fatal weaknesses. But it failed to stop expansion. In 2004, in blatant defiance of the Twelve Block Agreement, a major health care complex tracked its oversized footprints into an entire city block. Children”'s Hospital surreptitiously bought out owners of 28 homes, a former church building and a gas station.… Read the rest “Last building on BLOCK 5: Lost Heritage & Trust”

Letter to the Editor: While hoping for Sale, Messiah”'s pianos to kids, hymnals to Africa, music to churches, and archives to smaller boxes

Dear Editor,

After speaking to you, I hear that here are many issues involved in the possible sale of the Historic Messiah Church.

I wish to address just one assumption from your paper. 

As a long-time member of Messiah, I was very hurt by the intimation that we would “trash” our beautiful sanctuary.

To me it seems inevitable that we will have to sell our property.  But that does not mean that we are not responsibly caring for our building. After 100 years of occupancy, it as an enormous task to make sure the move to vacancy is done with the dignity and love that it deserves.

For example:

We are considering Keys/4/4/Kids for our four pianos.

We are considering Books for Africa for our hymnals.

We are looking for other churches interested in inheriting our extensive music library.

We are gleaning and pruning our Archives to a manageable and meaningful size.

In the meantime, we will heat the necessary spaces with space heaters.

This all will be done in God”'s time. I pray that it doesn”'t take long.

Blessings, Sincerely, Ann E. Keating

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