Today, we're taking you inside the Second Baptist Church of Detroit — the oldest historically Black church in Michigan, a former last stop on the Underground Railroad, and now a hub for human trafficking awareness and free STEAM education for Detroit kids.
I'm joined by Pastor Lawrence Rodgers to talk about nearly 190 years of history, how Greektown is transforming, and what it means to build a beloved community in Detroit right now.
In a moment when there's intense pressure to gloss over or sanitize our past, it feels especially important to lift up institutions that didn’t just witness history, but made it — and are still doing the work right now.
To kick off Black History Month, I’m grounding you in the deep history of a Detroit church that was the last stop on the Underground Railroad — and is also building for the future.
Although Michigan became a “free state,” slave catchers were able to operate here because federal fugitive slave laws explicitly gave them that power and forced even free states to cooperate, putting people in the position of choosing between following the law and compromising their humanity.
The pastor of Detroit's Second Baptist Church, Lawrence Rodgers, tells the story:
“In fact, one of our very first pastors, William Monroe, was a member of the Underground Railroad and Second Baptist was the last stop. If you could make it to Second, we would hide you in the basement, and we had a member named George DeBaptist who owned a steamboat and we had a wagon with a false bottom.
When the slave catchers were away, we would put people in the wagon and drive them to the river and put them in the steamboat and help them to get across to what was called affectionately in hymns, in a codified way, Canaan’s Land. ‘To Canaan’s land I’m on my way, where the soul of man never dies.’ This means, ‘I’m going to Canada, where there is freedom.’”
The conversation also looks to the future, including their community programs and what they’re planning to do when the streetscape renovations are done in Detroit’s Greektown.
You can listen on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or your favorite podcast app.
Feedback as always - dailydetroit -at- gmail -dot- com or leave a voicemail 313-789-3211.
