Si Faris, The Lebanese Storeowner of Rowlesburg

Si Faris (1913-1990) and his wife Freda

In 1985, a major transition happened in my life that launched me into my high school years.  After living six years in relative obscurity in the town of Kirby, WV, we moved back near my home territory that November with my grandparents to the town of Rowlesburg, WV.   Rowlesburg, in Preston County about 21 miles north of my hometown of Parsons, was a town which I was very familiar with as I had spent a lot of time there in my childhood years.  So, moving there to me at first seemed like a great idea, but unfortunately it was a rough year which awaited me ahead.  However, there were many bright spots during that year - that was the year, for instance, that I was baptized and became part of the Church, and it was also a year in which I got to know some fascinating people.  One of the most fascinating was a portly, bushy-haired Lebanese store owner by the name of Si Faris, and his wife Freda.

Si was a bit of a local fixture in Rowlesburg, as he owned the main store - which also served as a bar and at one point a restaurant - and opinions varied about him.  For some, he was the greatest thing since sliced bread.  For others, he was accused of being a bit of a self-serving crook.  In reality though, Si was a hard-working man with a shrewd business sense, yet he also could be very compassionate to local people.  For one thing, he often extended store credit to people without question, as he fully understood that many local people were on fixed incomes and this was the only way many of them could manage to get the essential items they needed for their homes.  On another occasion too, a local man was having issues with his windshield wipers, and when Si heard about it, he told the man to take the ones off his Lincoln car to use, no questions asked.  This was the essence, I truly believe, of who Si Faris truly was.

A lot of detractors made false accusations against Si I believe for a couple of reasons.  First, mountain people back home were often quick to condemn someone out of jealousy who exhibited a little success, and therefore allegations of crookery wagged from their tongues (some of these talkers though were actually the real crooks - they'd steal you blind!).  Also, the fact Si was the son of Lebanese immigrants sort of brought out a latent bit of prejudice with some of these people, many of whom distrusted "ferners" of any type - I have heard a lot of that same nonsense spewed against the Fillipino doctors who worked in Romney too back in the day, even though those particular doctors were actually compassionate people and gave their cash-strapped patients a lot of leeway.  As much as I love where I am from, and I would not trade my West Virginia roots for anything, I will readily admit that some prejudice existed among local people there and it often led to a lot of unnecessary fiction regarding those who were of other ethnicities.  I have oftentimes confronted some of my fellow townspeople (including some in my own family) about some of that stupidity, reminding some of them that our own genepool was not what you would call 100% WASP either (our family had Jewish forebears).  Any rate, as I personally got to know Si and Freda (as well as their cousin, Bertha Nassif, who owned a shop on the next street), I got to understand and appreciate who they really were, and could accept them fully as persons, quirks and all.  Si, for instance, could be a bit cratchety, but underneath that gruffness was actually a compassionate soul who really reached out to the community in his own way.  He was not crooked, nor was he stingy - on the contrary, he would actually give you the shirt off his back, but just didn't want a fuss made about doing it!  

Si Faris's old store in Rowlesburg, as it appears today

Si, whose actual name was Sood Si Faris, was born in Thomas in February of 1913 to John Niggun (1879-1946) and Shomenia (Salim) Faris (1895-1958).  John had immigrated with his brother Elias sometime around 1895 from Lebanon, and they had settled around Uniontown, PA.  The Farises were one of a number of families of Syro-Maronite Catholic Christians who had fled persecution in the Middle East, and where they had settled they formed a pretty close-knit community.  Another family that came over around the same time was the Johns (or Yokhnans) from the same region - Si's wife Freda, as well as her cousin Bertha, came from that family.  The Maronites were a non-Arab Christian people whose religious heritage went back to an Assyrian monk, St. Maron, who settled along the Orontes River near present-day Antioch in the 3rd century.  As the order he founded grew, more laypeople converted from the Levantine population, and eventually they settled in what was called the Qaddisha Valley in eastern Lebanon.  They have undergone a lot of violent persecution over the centuries, especially at the hands of Islamic militants, and being many of them were given better opportunities to be educated, they also fled the region for the West, with many settling in the US.  For some reason, Uniontown, PA attracted a lot of them, and even today they still have quite a presence there.  I personally was introduced to the Maronites by Si and Freda, and have since then taken a keen interest in them, leading to my own crismation on Easter 2000 as a Maronite-rite Catholic myself.  Freda had a lot to do with that, because she and her cousin Bertha got me going to church again, although ultimately it was my step-great-aunt Betty who really got me involved later on.  I owe Freda, Si, and Bertha a great debt for that too, as they had a key part to play in my own Christian conversion. 

Although Si's family settled in Uniontown, and many of his relatives still lived up there (plus, it was the location of their Maronite parish, St. George, where Si and many of his relatives were baptized, christened, married, and buried), Si himself was born in Thomas, while Freda was born in Rowlesburg.  How that happened I am not sure, but Uniontown is only about an hour away from Rowlesburg, so it kind of makes sense.  Si, as he came of age, got into the retail business, and soon was able to earn a good income for himself.  In time, he also played a role in the civic affairs of Rowlesburg, being a member of the Ruritans and other organizations.  Their cousin, Joe Nassif and his wife Bertha, also settled comfortably in Rowlesburg as well and became an integral part of the community.  And, so it was for many decades.

In the winter of 1986, Mom actually did some housekeeping work for Freda, as she was getting physically unable to keep up and needed extra help.  Si and Freda often employed a lot of the local people to do odd jobs for them to help them earn a little cash, and even I had the privilege of working for Si - my job was shoveling off his sidewalk during the winter in order to keep it from getting slippery and endangering his customers.  Mom actually enjoyed working with Freda, and she also got to know them pretty well - eventually, that is how I got invited to Mass at St. Philomena's, the little Roman Catholic parish in Rowlesburg where Freda and her cousin Bertha attended due to the fact the Maronite parish they were part of was at considerable distance away.  It was not uncommon on Sundays to see a gangly Jewish teenager walking two elderly Lebanese ladies to Mass, and some people thought it was amusing.  That arrangement lasted for a few months until I made the decision to join the Baptist church instead, and was baptized on February 9th, 1986.  Despite joining the Baptist church though, I still kept in touch and close with both Freda and Bertha for a few years afterward.  I often wonder though if maybe I should have become Catholic then instead of joining the Baptists, as in the future I would become Catholic anyway?  Well, I figure God had his reasons for allowing things, and that Baptist church helped me in a lot of ways then too, so it was all good regardless. 

St. Philomena Church in Rowlesburg (now closed), where I used to attend Mass with Freda Faris and Bertha Nassif on Sundays as a teenager.

Si, Freda, nor Bertha actually lived to see me become Catholic, and that is unfortunate they didn't.  I still think a lot about these good people, and do miss them - it was a rare opportunity to get to know them so well, and knowing them also gave me a sensitivity toward the plight of Middle Eastern Christians today, and I still support the causes of a number of Middle Eastern Christian communities as a self-styled activist and advocate.  One day, I am confident I will see them in the hereafter, because oftentimes what we don't see, God does - Si Faris did a lot of good for the people of Rowlesburg, I believe, that only the Lord knows about, and despite some idiotic rumors and tongue-wagging from many back home about him and his family, I believe he was truly a stellar human being in a gruff, cranky exterior.  God bless Si and Freda, and God grant them and Bertha Nassif, as well as many other Maronite members of our communities who have gone to their eternal reward, eternal rest. 

The Pioneering Lady Preacher

(on right) Rev. Lilly Carr Plaugher (1900-1993)

(photo courtesy of Becky Carr Booth)

Among the memorable people we have been talking about over the past couple of years is a lady who I remember fondly from my childhood.  Back in the day, my mother would often take my late great-grandmother over to the little Pentecostal Church in the Rosendorf section of my hometown of Hendricks, WV, and the reason was deeply personal to my great-grandmother, which I will talk about shortly.  In those days, a lively little lady pastor who was also distantly related to me led that congregation, and Rev. Lilly Carr Plaugher was truly a pioneer of her time.  To give some background though, I want to first off give a little history of the church itself, then a brief snippet of the Pentecostal denomination it is part of, and then we want to talk about Sis. Plaugher.

Tucker County has always been an area in which many people had a deep and very zealous Christian faith, and this was expressed in many of the churches established in the area.  In the early 1900's, my great-grandfather, Rev. Charles Judson Strahin, was a circuit-riding minister who held credentials with both the Dunkards and the United Brethren denominations, and he was responsible for cultivating a large number of churches in the upper Potomac Highlands region of West Virginia, including one that was started in 1919 in an old school in Hendricks, specifically Rosendorf.  According to Homer Floyd Fansler's History of Tucker County (Parsons, WV:  McClain Printing, 1962) this congregation was established as what was then called a "union church" on May 25, 1919 (Fansler, 366).  Now, let me explain what a "Union Church" was back then.  Due to financial limitations and the fact that many churches of various denominations were small in the average West Virginia town, it was common for congregations of various denominations to share a facility.  The way this normally worked was that one group would have its services on a given Sunday, while the others would have theirs on other Sundays during the month.  The devoutly religious mountain folks though did not want to just attend one service a month, so what would happen was that many of them would attend all the services in that particular church building, and some would even have multiple memberships.  And, it was also not uncommon then for ministers to serve congregations of different denominations, and some even held multiple credentials (as did my great-grandfather).  It promoted a sort of grassroots ecumenism that even today still is evident in the mindset and spiritual convictions of many back home.  Also, the various faith traditions often found shared convictions with each other - this was particularly true of the Dunkards, United Brethren, Methodists, and early Holiness denominations that emerged in that area - thus making even more common ground.  So, the result was a "Union Church," which served the needs of a diverse group of congregants from many backgrounds.  This arrangement can still even be found in some remote towns back home even today - even in the South, it is sometimes common to find Methodists and Baptists sharing church buildings in the same way.  

The Rosendorf Church in Hendricks, WV, as it appears today

In the late 1800's and early 1900's, this "Union Church" system, as well as the more conservative Wesleyan/pietist-based religion of many Appalachian Christians, made the region a fertile ground for the spread of two renewal movements - the first, in the late 1800's, was the Holiness movement, which found a ready audience among the more conservative-minded Methodists and United Brethren people of the Potomac Highlands.  Then, in 1906, the Azuza Street meetings in Los Angeles brought to prominence a variation of the Holiness tradition called Pentecostalism, and that too found a ready and eager following in the mountains.  Many early members of the "Union Churches" as well experienced powerful revivals in which Pentecostal spirituality renewed congregations, thus necessitating proper changes to these churches.  One of those impacted by this phenomenon was the Rosendorf Church in Hendricks.  Cleta Long, whose supplemental Tucker County history published in 1996 included a more detailed account of the origins of the Rosendorf Church than did Fansler's, notes that in the early days the budding Pentecostal congregation was one of those groups who shared in the "Union Church" fellowship, but the emotional manifestations and lively worship of the Pentecostal congregation was not without its controversy for the time, and on occasions disputes did happen, which was unfortunate for all parties involved.  In some cases, according to Long, the meetings were forced to be held outside the church facility in Emmett Cross's granary nearby in those early days (Cleta Long, History of Tucker County, p. 162).  In time though, Sis. Plaugher became the pastor of the church (sources I have say that occurred in 1939), and also in due course of time and events, the Pentecostals eventually were able to gain possession of the building (which happened I believe prior to Sis. Plaugher's leadership), which they kept to this very day - my estimation as to when that happened was the late 1920's or early 1930's.  By this time, many of the other congregations who were part of the original "Union Church" experiment were long gone, and my great-grandfather, Charles Judson Strahin, had passed away by 1933.  So, in a sense, the Pentecostals deserve merit for keeping the spiritual legacy of this old church alive.

When Sis. Plaugher took over the pastoral leadership of the young Pentecostal congregation, the need for a covering arose, and soon the little church became part of a denomination called the Pentecostal Church of God.  The origins of the Pentecostal Church of God go back to 1919, when a group of Assemblies of God members withdrew from the parent body in protest of what it felt was an imposed rigidity of codified statements of faith - the A/G adopted its Statement of Fundamental Truths back in 1916, not long after its founding, and they have been the governing convictions of the A/G to this day.  The Pentecostal Church of God faction didn't disagree with the beliefs contained in the statement, but rather the rigidity of codification.  The new group formed under the leadership of former A/G Executive presbyter John C. Sinclair as the Pentecostal Assemblies of the USA, but adopted its present name in 1922 after some organizational growing pains happened. The group was initially headquartered in Chicago, but after a series of subsequent moves it settled in Joplin, MO, where its headquarters remained up until 2011, when a series of devastating tornadoes forced a move (W.E. Warner, "Pentecostal Church of God," in Burgess, McGee, and Alexander, Dictionary of Pentecostal and Charismatic Movements {Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1988}p. 701).  Its current offices are housed in Bedford TX (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pentecostal_Church_of_God).  It is still a pretty large denomination, and in my native Tucker County, they managed to start 2 congregations within a few miles of each other - one was the Rosendorf Church, and the other was in nearby Hambleton, which was for many years pastored by Sis. Plaugher's younger brother Floyd.  In 1988, Floyd also took over the pastorate of the Rosendorf Church until his passing in 2008.  His great-grandson, Adam Snyder (whose mother, Becky, has been such a tremendous help with all this information) is the current pastor of the church, which although small in number is still a very vibrant and active congregation.  

Sis. Plaugher herself was a lifelong resident of Tucker County, having been born there in 1900 to the late Oliver Homer and Louisa Carr.  Somewhere back in the family tree, she is also distantly related to me, as Oliver Homer Carr was himself the great-grandson of Solomon Carr (1805-1866) and Susannah Lambert (1809-1900) - their daughter, Angeline Carr (b. 1857), was my 3rd great-grandmother.   So, Sis. Plaugher was family.  She is credited by Cleta Long as being the first lady minister in Tucker County, although there were two other contemporaries who could be worthy contenders of that title - one is Wilma Waybright, who for decades carried on the ministerial duties at the Sugarlands Dunkard Church (Wilma Waybright is the daughter of Rev. Stanley Waybright, who pastored Whitedale Church in Terra Alta - his son LaVerne was a classmate of mine in high school and a good buddy, but we were also 5th cousins too), and the other was Rev. Iris Skipper, who pastored the Glad Tidings Assembly of God congregation on Location north of Saint George.   Whatever the case, Sis. Plaugher still had an amazing legacy of her own, and that rich heritage is still carried on today with her own family, as they continue to lead that little church in Rosendorf.  I remember going up there a lot with Mom when I was a kid, and the lively services - one thing in particular was a member of the congregation, Junior Knotts, who used to play a guitar-and-harmonica contraption as part of the worship.  The place frankly scared me as a young boy, as the Pentecostals tended to be lively and the end-times talk that characterized many of the sermons then could be a bit disconcerting for a 7-year-old (it wasn't what they said that was wrong though, but rather my mixed-up mother going off on tangents with it later).  And, although our family had some strong ties to that little church, in reality Granny was more at home attending the Free Methodist church in town, where she went faithfully for many years.  But, for the most part overall, many of the people who attended Sis. Plaugher's little church in Rosendorf were good folks, very devout, and the memory I had of them was that they were a people who really lived out their convictions.  A lot of that is due to the capable leadership of their pastor, as Sis. Plaugher led them well.

As an Anglo-Catholic today, for the most part I would personally be opposed to women clergy, but not to women preachers - God has raised up some tremendous women over the decades to proclaim his Word, and whether they should be pastors or not is something that would be more of a theological issue, but the Bible and the tradition of the Church doesn't seem to have an issue with women preaching the Word - actually, even in our Church we have a strong tradition of the ministry of the deaconess, and that has its precedence in various passages of Scripture, particularly Joel 2:28.  I believe that Sis. Plaugher personally was one of those great lady preachers, and the only regrettable thing is that she didn't have more of her great legacy preserved, as many younger Pentecostals could use that today.  Her grand-nephew Adam is also doing a fine job of providing spiritual leadership to that little congregation, and in a sense, he is the living legacy of that great heritage.  Any rate, I wanted to share Sis. Plaugher's story here today, and hopefully it will inspire others who read about it.  

The Wise Professing To Be Fools - A Practical View

"Professing to be wise, they became fools..."  Although this is a Scripture passage from Romans, this is not an article about hermeneutics or theology, but rather about academic snobbery.  I had an experience recently that sort of got me off on this, and I wanted to share it because I am sure others reading this can identify.

Recently, I wrote an article for a small theological journal a good friend of mine, Fr. Jack Ashcraft, initiated entitled The Watchman Theological Journal.  Although I had an article on Transhumanism published in the first issue, and the journal had potential, unfortunately Fr. Jack had to discontinue it because not enough people were contributing.  I was slated to have an article published in the next issue regarding Appalachian Theology, and as a person of Appalachian heritage with theological training I felt like I had the base qualifications to do it, and so did Fr. Jack.  Therefore, with the Watchman Journal now defunct, I had to look for other venues to publish the article, and of course one that came to mind was the Appalachian Studies Association.  Boy, was I disappointed!  Let me elaborate.

The person exercising a godlike rejection of my article is a Sociology professor at the University of Kentucky by the name of Shauna Scott, and although a simple "we're not interested" should have sufficed, this woman proceeded to arrogantly and summarily dismiss me as being "not scholarly enough" and too "personal," in essence.  Before we go further, let us examine Dr. Scott's credentials and see how qualified she is to speak for Appalachian people.

Shauna Scott is, first off, a Californian - she got her Ph.D. in 1988 from the University of California, and when looking at what she's done, it isn't exactly stuff the average Appalachian townsperson would share in conviction with - she is involved in feminism, and her research seems to be more attuned with environmentalist agendas than it is with the daily lives of Appalachian people.  Unfortunately, this discipline called "Appalachian Studies" is infested with degreed professional "outlanders," many of whom have never stepped on the slope of a mountain in their lives.  If a White professor tried to do that with the Black Studies department of a major university, he would be decried as a "racist" or worse, yet it is interesting that these same people can take liberties at proclaiming themselves "experts" on everything just because they read a book or two on it.  However, the real insult is how they summarily dismiss people who actually do come from the region and have written on it, as I have.  Granted, this is not a blanket condemnation of all Appalachian scholarship, as Dr. Ralph Hood, also a native Californian, has written extensively (and fairly) on serpent-handlers from a sociological perspective - the difference though is that Hood has lived among them, participated in their church services, and even gained the close friendship of many of them.  I don't see this Shauna Scott person doing that - the amusing picture I had of her, as a matter of fact, is her trying to figure out how to use an outhouse!   So, yes, outside of the theological spectrum, many people do profess to be wise but make fools of themselves (Romans 1:22 if you want a chapter-and-verse reference) - the good Dr. Scott is one of those.  I understand why oftentimes higher education is eschewed now by some religious groups - you read a bunch of books, write a verbose thesis, and walk an aisle to talk about practically nothing.  Hence, the term "professor" - it is one thing to "profess" something, but quite another to live it. Some stellar academics I know get that, and they are the true greats because they put their money where their mouths are - people like the late Dr. J.W. Lee, who taught many of my Old Testament courses years ago, as well as Dr. Regis Martin at Franciscan University, and Dr. Loyal Jones at Berean College in Kentucky.  These men understand true scholarship, and others like this Scott person could learn a thing or two from them.   Unfortunately, in this day and age, many are not willing to learn because further learning is beneath their arrogant egos - they fail to realize that we are still mortal, fallible, human beings, and last I heard only God was omniscient (of course, many of these fools are atheistic anyway - they can't confine God, so they dismiss him as a "primitive stimulus" or something).

Maybe it is time that many of us who do have something to say form a society of our own - Fr. Jack, to his credit, attempted to do that, and I only wish he could have kept it up.  The unfortunate thing about much current "mainstream" scholarship is that in many cases it has a bunch of uppity academics with "ivory-tower syndrome" who don't like their academic paradigms rocked.  It is really unfortunate, because oftentimes those individuals stifle the creativity and voice of others, and if someone is unfortunate enough to sit in a classroom with these people, the passion a poor student has for a subject may quickly be destroyed by these uppity, snooty academics who set themselves up as judge, jury, and executioner of their students' futures.

That being said, I have vented some serious frustrations I have had for some time, but I want to say something in closing especially to religious academics - some of you are hypocrites in that you seem to have no issue with messing with theological orthodoxy, yet God forbid that your other paradigms are rocked.  Many of you are so concerned with sterile, soulless writing that it is more for you to handle when a student expresses his or her passion in their scholarly writing.  And, that is the reason why I plan on doing a personal campaign for true scholarship, scholarship that embodies academic excellence while also allowing the writer to express their enthusiasm for what they are writing about without some snob with a Ph.D. title after their name condemning them for it.  It is time for change to be where change is due, and that is in the area of academic writing.  And, for you stuck-up bluebloods who have your condescending tones and personal agendas behind the lecterns of many universities, let me say this if you try to hinder - like Clint Eastwood's oft-quoted classic movie line, "make my day!"

Miss Mae, The Preacher's Widow

In life you often meet some fascinating people, and especially when you are in church circles.  One of those we met recently is a 91-year-old preacher's widow known affectionately as "Miss Mae."   Back in November, we had a wedding at our parish church, and the bride, a sweet Korean lady named Kim, had as her "maid of honor" this little 91-year-old lady (Kim is in the picture on the left above, with the beautiful traditional Korean wedding gown she made herself) that happened to be her neighbor.  Being we also took part in the wedding preparations (Barb decorated the church for the couple), I got an opportunity to chat with Miss Mae, and she was very interesting to talk to.

Miss Mae's late husband, Rev. Carl Beatty, was at one time a minister in the Free Methodist Church.  Anyone who knows me personally knows that this was one point of connection with me as well, being my family had for years attended the Free Methodist Church in my hometown of Hendricks, WV.  Unfortunately, in October 1973, Rev. Beatty's life was cut short when he was involved in a car accident with a drunk driver, and Miss Mae has been widowed since.  I was reading up a little on the Beattys and their legacy, and it turns out they were quite the pioneers in the early Free Methodist work here in the Southeast, as practically every Free Methodist congregation on the I-4 corridor here can trace its roots back to them.  They were largely instrumental back in the day for the growth of the Southeast Regional Conference of the Free Methodist Church.  Although there is some good information about his ministry at http://www.lightandlifepark.org/History/History.html, I unfortunately don't have access to a lot of photos of the early ministry and such.  Maybe later in a revision I can include some more stuff after another conversation with Miss Mae later.

Miss Mae herself was a native of Georgia, as she originally was from up around the area of Athens or Gainesville.  She attended Toccoa Falls College up there, although she tells me her education was cut short in 1941 by a little thing called Pearl Harbor.  She doesn't seem to regret that interruption, and at present she lives in a retirement park over in Winter Haven near where our own parish church is.  She has been a frequent visitor to our parish since Paul and Kim, the couple who recently got married and are her neighbors, began to be regular parishioners last year.  Miss Mae normally attends a local Baptist church (she is none too pleased with some of the modernity that the Free Methodists have embraced, and chooses not to go to a Free Methodist congregation - she is very old-school!) but we are seeing more of her recently, but that is a blessing to us.  Plus, she loves the potlucks too - that little lady does love fried chicken!

Paul and Kim, our parishioners who are Miss Mae's neighbors, love her like she was their own mother, and she reciprocates, always wanting to do things for them.   That charitable notion on her part though has led to some amusing stories.  For instance, Kim is a talented cook, seamstress, and all sorts of other things, and to aid in her culinary projects, Kim plants and grows a lot of her own produce.  One day, while doing some work around the house, Kim hears some activity outside near her vegetable patch, and she notices - to her horror! - that Miss Mae is whacking away at her napa cabbage plants.  In great panic, Kim rushes out the door and frantically asks Miss Mae, "What are you doing??" to which Miss Mae responds that Kim had some "weeds" that needed taken care of, and she thought she'd do the job.  However, the "weeds" were actually Kim's vegetables!  She is also noted for amusingly micro-managing the landscapers in the community where they all live, and for some reason she takes a pair of HUGE pruning sheers and "corrects" the landscaper's work because they didn't do it right according to her. Although probably a source of consternation to the landscapers, Miss Mae's intentions are good, and she just wants to be helpful - plus it is kind of cute to see a 91-year-old lady out there giving the landscapers grief!  Paul also noted that Miss Mae tends to have some hoarding tendencies, as she never throws anything out and her house has been described as being a combination of a museum and a warehouse.   One day, when Paul was visiting her to check on her to make sure she was OK, he had to somehow maneuver between a wall of boxes in her place to get to where he was going, and upon expressing the logistical difficulties of the passage to Miss Mae, her reply was "Don't worry about it - fatter men than you have gotten through there."  My mother, who has an interest in Free Methodist heritage herself, is interested in finding out if Miss Mae has any of the old Light and Life magazines (the official denominational organ) from years back, and my guess would be that might be highly possible - I probably will ask Miss Mae about that when I see her again to be sure though.

Being Miss Mae was also a secretary-historian for the regional Free Methodist organization, she is also a wealth of knowledge for anyone interested in the early history of this denomination in the South.  I have actually enjoyed talking with her about all that stuff, and she is quite overjoyed that someone actually knows what a Free Methodist is (many of our own parishioners, God bless them, thought Miss Mae was United Methodist, which she instantly corrected - Free Methodists and United Methodists are actually very different!) and we talk a lot about that when she visits the parish.  One day, I need to really sit down with her and get some information from her too, as much of this should be recorded in some shape or form, and she is a wealth of information.  In this day and age, with so many people squawking the mantra of "change" even in church circles, many younger people have a serious disconnect from the older generations.  It is sad too, because much of what is wrong with society today is due to the fact some younger people don't appreciate or listen to the wisdom of the old.  This is so unfortunate on so many levels because with these older folks (Miss Mae being 91 now, for instance) having only a short time to be on the earth yet, it is important to preserve the legacy they carry, because once they die that legacy is buried with them if they don't.  The purpose of me telling you stories of people like Miss Mae here is the same - it is to preserve a legacy.  Many of the other people's stories I have shared with you here in recent months have already passed on to their eternal reward, but fortunately I have a wealth of knowledge of my own I had inherited from them to aid in preserving their legacies, and that is something I hope to continue doing for a long time.  Fortunately, Miss Mae is still alive and doing very well at this point, but remember she is 91, so there is so much more of her legacy that needs to be preserved in the time she has left.

Although I have only gotten to know Miss Mae in the past year or so, she is someone you can't help but love - she is a precious lady, and I personally pray that this eccentric little Southern preacher's widow will be with us a few more years, and hopefully I can share more about her legacy later.  God bless until next time.

The Compassionate Small-Town Scholar/Pastor

Rev'd Dr. Woodrow I. Brown (1918-2006)

 

Over the years there have been a number of clergy that I can say have impacted me just by being able to know them.  Back when I was a kid in Kirby, WV, my mother wanted to have a local pastor to identify with despite the fact she herself was backslid.  Although she was presupposed to Pentecostal churches, the local Assemblies of God pastor in Kirby was really not that impressive (the man cancelled Sunday services at one point for the Superbowl, which gives you an idea of his spiritual leadership!).  So, staying true to our roots, Mom got in touch with a local Brethren pastor who actually was quite a distance away (Kirby was about 20 miles from this particular church), and that pastor was Rev. Woodrow Brown.  I want to share a little of his legacy here because he was a true spiritual mentor to many, and he had a heart for the people he ministered to.  I want to start by first giving a background of the church he pastored, as that was a fascinating story in itself, and then I want to tell a little of Rev. Brown's story.

Rev. Brown pastored the Tearcoat Church of the Brethren, which was located about 6 miles east of Augusta, WV, just off US 50, and pastored there for Lord only knows how many years.   The Brethren Church was of course where my own family's roots were too, and many of the local congregations of Brethren in our part of West Virginia were old congregations, some over 200 years.  Tearcoat Church was originally built in 1875 by what was then a congregation of 45 members whose ancestors arrived in the region back in the late 1700's, and many of them became farmers (many of the notable peach and apple orchards of the area are still operated by those families, notably the Shanholtz clan).  When it was built, it was considered to be one of the largest Dunkard congregations in the area, according to West Virginia Brethren historian Emmert Bittinger in his classic volume, Allegheny Passages (Camden, ME: Penobscot Press, 1990) on pages 375-376.   Today, the church is still huge by comparison of many area churches of any denomination, but it also has the membership still to maintain such a large structure.  I am not exactly sure when Rev. Brown came to the Tearcoat church, but it had to have been sometime in the 1970's - no source on him has the exact dates of his tenure.  That now leads to Rev. Brown's story.

Tearcoat Church of the Brethren, just east of Augusta, WV, as it appears today

 

Woodrow I. Brown was born in the town of Peebles, OH, on October 2, 1918.  Although he later pastored Brethren churches, he was initially ordained as a Baptist, and throughout his life and ministry he was noted for being fairly conservative in his doctrine as a result.   That ordination, according to the biographical information provided on the back cover of his book, Father's Faith (Ememclaw, WA: WinePress Publishing, 2006), happened in 1948.   He also attended Wilmington College, but he received his degrees from Practical Bible Seminary in Hagerstown, MD, as well as a degree from Davis College later.  It wasn't until he was in his 60's that he received a Doctorate in Christian Education in 1982.   After pastoring in several states, he finally settled at Tearcoat and eventually retired as Pastor Emiritus from there in the late 1990's.  Now, it is his final resting-place - no doubt he loved that congregation, and they still hold him in high regard too.

We first met Rev. Brown in 1980, when Mom called him for pastoral care during one of her "spirit-filled" (she drank a lot, in other words!) episodes.   However, Rev. Brown was always one to be there when called, as unfortunately my grandmother and step-grandfather discovered later when they reasoned that "pastor" must mean unofficial free taxi, and they milked that to the fullest (I would choke them today for taking advantage of this dear man of God, but they are deceased already) and didn't even give him the privelege of attending one service at the church.   Many people get skewered notions that a minister is to be a personal slave, and it is truly shameful that a minister is often called upon to do this or do that for people who don't even attend his church - that has become a serious pet-peeve of mine over the years.  My family was no exception - many of them would not darken the door of a church unless someone died, yet they expect ministers to be at their beck and call.  Those lazy jackasses need to attend a church once in a while rather than just sucking the life out of preachers, and it would do them good to make that sacrifice!  However, Rev. Brown ran errands and did other menial tasks like that gracefully, and I am sure Christ has given him a crown of something for such extraordinary endurance dished out by some of the most obnoxious examples of God's creation.  I admired that about him, but wanted to kick my mom and grandparents in the butt for doing what they did.  Many ministers today go the other extreme, thinking they are too high and mighty to do anything except preach, and those irk me as well.  The examples of true men of God like Rev. Brown shame some of these modern-day spoiled, fat-bellied self-proclaimed "ministers" who are often more interested in making names for themselves rather than serving the God they claim to speak for.   It is tragic, but I digress and will refrain now from soapboxing!

I mentioned that Rev. Brown authored some books, and I hold in my hand now one his son Ralph published posthumously of many of his dad's most inspiring messages.   Rev. Brown was a true scholar, and often appealed to literature, science, and even philosophy to communicate an affirmed truth in Scripture.  Reading many of his sermons, as well as hearing them, you begin to see that he was a well-read man and didn't just over-spiritualize everything.  Much of his preaching was eschatological, and he believed that the history recorded in the Bible set the stage for all the redemptive acts of Christ, from the Incarnation to the Second Coming.  Although many "theologians" would summarily dismiss his book as a "popular devotional work," Rev. Brown's sermons did pack a punch!  At the same time, Rev. Brown had almost a childlike sense of awe regarding God's creation - in one quote, he said this: "Needless to say, I have seen everything on earth in my travels many times and I still marvel at the power of the Word of that man who started and kept moving all the trillions of tons of molecules from the roof of the boat (meaning the Ark) that day."  This was part of a devotional message he entitled "The Biographical Travelogue of Miss Molly Cule," in which he personifies a single molecule (hence, "Molly Cule"!) by telling the wonders of creation from that perspective.  This is something that slaps in the face the theology of many Pentecostals and Evangelicals, who often have a Gnostic-like hatred for the physical world in favor of the "life to come" that is somehow superior and better.  What Rev. Brown, as well as Catholic theologians such as Henri de Lubac, realized was that what God created was good, although a Methodist minister, Dr. Kip Laxson, takes it a step further by saying in one of his recent sermons that when God said at the Creation "it is good," he also meant that he saw (as God has foreknowledge of course) how the beauty of creation would become, and as Dr. Laxson succinctly put it, that is what God saw as "good."   It is a similar statement that my Theology professor at Franciscan University, Dr. Regis Martin, echoes when he talks about justification - God sees the dung as good, enters into it, and from it comes a bountiful harvest.  Rev. Brown follows a similar line of thought in his writings too.  Reading this made me think too - why don't we act as better stewards of the earth God has given us??   That doesn't mean that we should all become members of Greenpeace (as they have an anti-human, anti-Christian agenda of ZPG), but rather that we should see the creative hand of God in that hibiscus flower outside our front window, and in the flock of white ibis that forage the bugs out of our yards here in Florida for example.  It's a good lesson to learn, and I hope to utilize it on my Sacramental Present Truths page in the future.  Sufficive to say, I am talking more theology and memoirs now, so let's wrap up.

In summary, Rev. Brown had the mind of a scholar, and the heart of a pastor, and he was a gift of God to a small West Virginia town that needed a ministry like his.  He has gone onto his eternal reward, but his legacy is a heritage that will bless those who knew him for many years to come, provided the Lord chooses to tarry.  God bless until next time.

 

The Old Country Parson

Rev. William Cecil "W.C." Dunson (1901-1994)

 

 

In small communities where I grew up in West Virginia, the local minister often becomes an iconic symbol of leadership.  This stems back to the old days when for the most part church meetings were the pivotal activity of the week in many isolated communities, and in many cases, the local pastor was often also the most educated person who was looked up to in order to fill a number of roles besides just preaching, marrying, baptizing, and burying.  In many cases too, churches didn't have the luxury a lot of times of having a full-time minister, so in many cases the local preacher served a "circuit" of churches in the area that he visited on certain days of the month.  This was true of many denominations in the hills, in particular the Methodists, but also even Catholic priests had to serve their parishioners that way a lot of times.  The person I am about to talk about was a living testimony to those times, as he exemplified the classic mountain circuit-riding parson in his day.  

Rev. W.C. Dunson is a name that many people in eastern Preston County from a couple of generations back will know well - his name brings back a lot of fond memories to many of the older folks who did know him, and to this day he is still an integral part of the history of the area.  Rev. Dunson belonged to what was then called the Evangelical United Brethren denomination, and before I talk about him I feel a little history lesson is in order, as many reading this may not know much about this denominational tradition.  In around the year 1767, a revival meeting took place in a barn owned by one Isaac Long near Lancaster, Pennsylvania, under the spiritual direction of a Mennonite clergyman by the name of Martin Boehm (1725-1812) - it was at the time of the First Great Awakening when a revivalistic fervor was touching much of the nation then, including the Pennsylvania Germans.  Attending this meeting was a German Reformed pastor from Maryland, Rev. Phillip Otterbein (1726-1813) who had recently taken over the pastorate of the German Reformed Church in Lancaster.  Otterbein somehow received a dramatic spiritual awakening at the Isaac Long barn meetings, and at one of those services, according to an account recorded by Henry Spayth, Otterbein arose and embraced Boehm, uttering the classic proclamation, "Wir Sind Bruder!" which resulted in an outbreak of emotional joy in the meeting - this is historically credited with being the birth of the United Brethren movement, although it was not officially established until the early 1800's (Paul R. Fetters, Trials and Triumphs - History of the Church of the United Brethren in Christ {Huntington, IN: UB Dept of Church Services, 1984} p. 45).   The United Brethren movement later developed close ties, via its Great Awakening involvement, with the emerging Methodist movement, even adopting Wesleyan doctrine and spirituality from their Methodist peers.  The movement was also part of a larger German Christian movement in the US at the time called the "River Brethren," although a split happened early on which formed the Brethren In Christ, a Mennonite/Wesleyan denomination which in time identified closely with the Holiness movement.  Another group of Wesleyan-doctrine Mennonites in the 1800's called the Albright Brethren also were birthed out of the Great Awakening, and from them emerged a denomination in 1811 called the Evangelical Church.  As the United Brethren continued to grow, some issues began to arise, and one of the big issues led to a split in the movement in 1889 over the issue of membership in secret societies - the party that supported the inclusion of Freemasons into membership were called "New Constitutionalists," while the party that opposed participation in secret societies were called "Old Constitutionalists."  In time, the "Old Constitutionalist" party retained the name United Brethren in Christ, and are today still a separate denomination.  The "New Constitutionalists" though would undergo more evolution and in 1946 would merge with the Evangelical Church to form the Evangelical United Brethren Church (Behny and Ehler, A History of the Evangelical United Brethren Church {Nashville: Abingdon, 1979} p. 357).   Due to much common ground with the Methodists, in 1968 the EUB and the Methodist Church effected a merger that created what is today known as the United Methodist Church.  

That brief history lesson has significance for West Virginia for two reasons.  First, the Holiness/Wesleyan revivals found fertile ground in the West Virginia mountains.  Second, in the area of northeastern West Virginia, a large population of Germans settled, and many of them were members of the United Brethren Church almost from the beginning, as well as bringing in later a large number of non-German converts in the region.  In many cases, the United Brethren had a very ecumenical attitude toward other churches, in particular the Methodists (with whom they shared many doctrinal convictions), the Dunkards, and the Mennonites, as well as German Evangelicals of the Albright tradition.  My great-grandfather, Rev. Charles Judson Strahin, for instance was credentialed by both the Dunkards and the United Brethren back in the earlier part of the 20th century.  Many of the United Brethren in West Virginia chose to be part of the majority "New Constitution" faction after the 1889 schism, and later on many of them became EUB churches (and subsequentially United Methodist congregations).  My great-grandfather, as well as Rev. Dunson, were both part of that group.  It is at this point we pick up with Rev. Dunson's story.

William Cecil Dunson was born on March 27, 1901, near the community of Queens, in Upshur County, WV.  He met and married his wife Elva in 1920 in Oakland, MD.  Being as many preachers in those days were bi-vocational, the young Rev. Dunson and his schoolteacher bride supported themselves by his working at first a lumber store and later at the state hospital in Weston, WV, as an orderly.  After working a couple of other small jobs in the region, the young W.C. was called to the ministry and in the late 1920's he was licensed with the state United Brethren conference to minister a circuit of churches in Gilmore County.  It was in 1937 that the young minister accepted a call to the Terra Alta area, and he accepted the Terra Alta Circuit of churches which he pastored for many years while also supplementing his family income as a clerk for the Post Office until he retired in 1965.  He also served many of the local Dunkard churches as minister on several occasions during those years, and he was noted as being a caring, honest parson who got to know many of his flock personally.  (information taken from an old undated news clipping I had in my files from the local paper, The Preston County News, that commemorated the 48th anniversary of his ministry)

The old Pine Grove Church on Salt Lick near Terra Alta, WV, one of the EUB (later Methodist) congregations in Rev. Dunson's Terra Alta circuit.

 

My own personal experience with Rev. Dunson came much later, in the late 1980's.   By that time, Rev. Dunson had long retired full-time ministry, although at the request of many of his older flock he still conducted funerals and guest-preached on occasion.  He and his wife then were content with being members of Trinity United Methodist Church in Terra Alta, which at one time was a EUB congregation on Rev. Dunson's former circuit years previous.   I didn't get the chance to talk to Rev. Dunson a lot then, although a nonagenarian lady my mother took care of, Myrtle Masters, was one of his former parishioners and still really close with him, so he would come to the house to visit her on occasion.  What I did know of him though was that he was a very humble man, soft-spoken, but at the same time he had a reverence about him that drew people - to put it in religious terms, the Spirit of God was with this man in a way that you couldn't describe but just knew.     He was spoken highly of by many residents of Terra Alta, Rowlesburg, and the surrounding communities, and his reputation today is still a fascinating piece of the local history.  The church he chose to be part of upon his retirement, Trinity in Terra Alta, was founded in 1904 as a EUB church, and Rev. Dunson actually pastored it for several years starting in 1945 (History of the Trinity United Methodist Church, Terra Alta, p. 4).  Overall, Rev. Dunson's life is a rich legacy as well as an inspiring testimony of how God used a country parson to touch so many people, and his influence continues today.

Rev. Dunson passed away at the age of 92 in January 1994, roughly six years after his wife Elva predeceased him in 1988.  Although I never got the chance to know him as well as I would have liked, he still impacted me with his own testimony in a good way, and I only hope that the spiritual legacy I leave will be even a fraction of his.  Rest Eternal, Parson.

Reverend Mister Pansler

Rev. Clarence Snyder Pansler (1915-2000)

(photo courtesy of his granddaughter, Karen Pansler Lam)

 

I want to now just give a little glimpse of my early college years and first couple of years of marriage as I remember perhaps one of the most interesting individuals we had ever met.   I want to first of all give a little historical background as to our situation at the time, as God sent this dear man to us at a time we had a very real need, and that is why I wanted to dedicate a little something here to his memory in the best way I know how to do so.

When I originally started college fresh out of high school in 1989, I originally began studies at a little Baptist college in the panhandle of Florida.  However, an interesting thing happened on June 21, 1989 - I received the Pentecostal experience, tongues and all, at a little Pentecostal Holiness church in Brunswick, GA, during a revival that particular week.  Up until that point in my life, although I was raised fairly familiar with Pentecostal religious tradition in my family, I was a bit turned off by it due to my mother's gross misrepresentation of what a Pentecostal was.  By the grace of God though, I did receive Christ as my Savior on a chilly January night in 1986, and in subsequent years I threw myself into the Baptist Church full force - I preached, taught Sunday School, served on church council, etc. all before I was 18 years old!  But, curiosity got the best of me that summer before college when, while staying with my dad and working to earn some money, I began to get curious and warm up to the idea that maybe these Pentecostals had something good to offer, which led me to the Pentecostal Holiness church where I got myself filled with the Holy Spirit.  That experience rocked my world at a really pivotal time - I was about to start college at this Southern Baptist Bible school, and here I was beginning to do things like pray in tongues!  That, of course, eventually led me out of the Baptist Church for good and I began a long tenure as part of the Foursquare Gospel denomination.   

1991 dawned later, and that proved to be a somewhat chaotic year, as by New Years Day 1992 I was on a bus headed for California to attend LIFE Bible College, which was the official Foursquare school.  Things didn't quite work out, and as 1992 dawned life was a mess - I found myself back in Dothan, AL, without a dime to my name and being lodged with one of the church members in a small apartment just south of downtown.  Barbara and I were not married yet, I had an insurmountable amount of debt, and had to do something fast, so I went to culinary school for a few months, which also paid me a small stipend.  Barb and I eventually got married on May 22 of that year, and at around the same time I was accepted into Southeastern College in Lakeland, FL, and we made the move, leaving everything we could not load in our car behind as we bunked at my mother-in-law's house that summer (a word of advice to you newly-married young people - do not under any circumstances live with your in-laws after you are first married, as it can be testy!).  Any rate, I started at Southeastern that August, but my mother-in-law lived almost two hours north in Ocala and we had to commute - that just was not going to work!  So, we had to do something fast!

 

Fortunately, we found a place in south Lakeland that was owned by a rather stuck-up retired minister named Carrier, but again, we ran into trouble - we could only stay there a week, and then were asked to move based on mud on our car.  However, it was not necessarily bad news in that one of the first things I did when I started school in Lakeland was to look up the local Foursquare Church, and come to find out one had just started there on Lemon Street.   The church, Family Praise and Worship Church, was started by a former Assembly of God minister by the name of Gene Pansler, and upon explaining our situation to him, Gene put us in touch with his grandfather who just happened to own a nice little mobile home park within walking distance of Southeastern's campus.  His grandfather, of course, was Rev. Clarence Pansler, himself a retired Pentecostal evangelist.  Now, I want to tell a little about him.

Clarence Snyder Pansler was born in Ohio in 1915, and as he related his testimony to us upon first meeting him, he apparently led a pretty wild life in the late 1920's and early 1930's as he came of age - he was involved in bootlegging liquor and some other questionable enterprises, although he told us his folks were United Brethren church members.  He had a dramatic conversion - I believe he said he actually attended one of Aimee Semple MacPherson's tent meetings back then - and responded to a call to preach.  In makeshift trailers, he crisscrossed the country with his wife and young family, finally ending up settling in Florida.  His first wife, Blanche, later passed away in 1985 and he later remarried a sweet little lady by the name of Myrtle, who remained with him until dementia finally compelled her family to place her in assisted living.  Clarence and Blanche ended up having two children, Eugene Sr. (1933-2009) and Lois (still living), and it was Eugene who provided him with a host of grandkids and later great-grandkids.   Eugene Sr. later became the Vice President of Southeastern College, a post he held for many years, and many of his own seven children ended up serving the Lord in their own way as well - Gene, as mentioned, was at one time our pastor, and another son, Karl, is a prominent local attorney, while a sister, Karen, is an attorney in her own right and also has a strong apologetics writing ministry.  In short, Clarence has given his family a very rich and spiritually vibrant heritage.

 

Dr. C. Eugene Pansler (1933-2009), Rev. Pansler's oldest son

 

 

 

 I grew to love and respect Rev. Pansler, as he was a good landlord, a great spiritual leader, and a mentor to so many.  Unfortunately, at the time we first met him, he was already in his late 70's and began to have issues with the upkeep of the mobile home park he maintained for many years - he often called his park a ministry to the students, and at one time he even had a small tabernacle there where he held services and provided some of the Ministry majors from Southeastern a place to hone their preaching skills.  When we moved there though, the tabernacle was a storage shed, and the small guest quarters in back of it was rented to us as an apartment, which at $200 monthly was a good deal for 1992!  However, in early 1993, he sold the park to a Canadian retiree named Bill Oxford, and spent the remainder of his days at a small luxury apartment near the Wal-Mart on South Florida Avenue in Lakeland.  Nonetheless, we still saw much of him in the six years we lived in the place, and his daughter Lois was our ever-present neighbor across the street.  

Rev. Pansler had his own brand of wisdom that only an old-time Pentecostal preacher could get away with dispensing.  When we first moved into the park in August 1992, for instance, we got the chance to visit a lot with Rev. Pansler and his wife Myrtle, and he dispensed a little free marriage counseling to us that to this day I still can recall well - being we were only married for a couple of months at that time, he advised us thus - "If you ever have the temptation to cheat, just remember that all donuts have the same hole!"  A little crass to some more religious ears to be sure, but true nonetheless!  I also still have in my library a copy of Smith Wigglesworth's Ever Increasing Faith, which is considered a Pentecostal spiritual classic, that Rev. Pansler gave to all young ministers as his way of saying that an unwavering faith in God is necessary to carry out one's calling.  Recently, when meeting with his grandson Karl on business, we swapped some stories about Rev. Pansler, and one of the ones Karl shared with me came from his grandfather's twilight years.  Where Rev. Pansler lived at the Imperial Apartments off of South Florida Avenue is a large shopping center that included a Wal-Mart as well as several restaurants, including interesting enough a Hooter's.   For many reading this, no explanation of what Hooter's is noted for (besides its wings, of course!) is necessary, but for some reason Rev. Pansler would go up there during an occasion and have lunch.  Karl, a little shocked that his devout Pentecostal minister granddad would even step foot in a Hooter's, asked him, "Granddad, why are you going up to Hooter's?"   His grandfather replied, "Well, the wings are good, plus Jesus loves Hooter's girls too."  The "Hooter's Girls" got to know him pretty well, and it is said that he may have possibly even got a couple of them going to church again.  There are probably a myriad of these stories about this guy which could be told along these lines, but one thing is consistent - he was a man who knew his Lord, and served Him with sincerity and consistency for many years.  And, that was the man's spiritual legacy to his family.  

Rev. Clarence Pansler passed on to his eternal reward on April 22, 2000, just past his 85th birthday.  The park he once operated as a ministry has since passed into the hands of others, and nine years after his repose his son, Dr. Eugene Pansler Sr., joined him in eternity.  Both of them represented a rare breed of minister and Christian witness that sadly lacks this day and age, and hopefully some who had the privelege of knowing Rev. Pansler personally will be faithful to carry on his legacy.  I am also still fairly close with many of his grandkids, as many of them do live in the area still, and I know they too are blessed with the great legacy their grandfather gave them too.  In a way, I also inherited a small part of that legacy, as he was a man I looked up to as well, and there are thousands of people who could probably testify to the same.  Rest Eternal, Rev. Pansler, until we see you again when the time comes.