BRICKS AND MORTALS
An Interview with
The Rev . Dr . Donna Schaper
by Gianfranco Grande
Executive Vice President , Partners for Sacred Places
Spending time with the Rev . Dr . Donna Schaper , one of the founders of Bricks and Mortals in New York City , is always time well spent . She ’ s a remarkable woman who is always full of ideas , initiatives , and opinions . She has been described as a career vagabond , an ideological contortionist , a political pontificator , a chic peasant , and many other things . Among the many congregations she has served is Judson Memorial Church , where she was Senior Pastor for over 15 years . She also teaches Leadership at Hartford International University for Religion and Peace and has published 39 books .
Yet , with all her accomplishments , I remember a morning of a few years ago , sitting in a frigid New York cafe , talking with Donna . I recall that during our conversation , I was touched by her warmth and love for people . In this volcano of a woman , her dark eyes burned with passion . There was a fire . Some might call it spirit .
Judson Memorial Church , New York City . Courtesy of Judson Memorial Church
Gianfranco Grande : What is Bricks and Mortals ? How did it start ?
Donna Schaper : Bricks and Mortals ( B + M ) started in 2018 as a question : Why is a church as vital as Judson Memorial always being held back by delayed maintenance rather than pushing forward into artistic , social , and spiritual activity ? We wanted to get to the bottom of the matter rather than just react , and we realized that we were focused on the immediate rather than on necessarily rebuilding our infrastructure . We had to fix the roof . We did . We more than fixed it . We put on a new roof that would last 100 years rather than the last three roofs which each lasted thirty years .
That longer term perspective opened our eyes to other potentials , not all of which are realized at this moment . The real shift happened in our brains . Our building WAS our mission . It wasn ’ t sinful , as we had previously thought , to spend money on what we called ourselves or our building . It was fundamental because the building and its roof and bathrooms and elevators were the body of God into which many spirits flowed .
Bricks and Mortals started as a shift in thinking from short term to longer term and in a reimagining of the holiness of a building . Then , because we were in New York City , we found others who were looking at the same conundrum in both faith-based places and in
© Ali Smith
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