What an act of vandalism shattered, acts of generosity restored at Mother Bethel AME Church

The Rev. Mark Kelly Tyler, senior pastor of Mother Bethel AME Church, said the church is in the midst of sending out thank-you notes to everyone who made the replacement of the historic stained-glass windows possible.

More than 400 donors gave thousands of dollars to fund the repairs after three windows were shattered in February in a predawn act of vandalism.

On Wednesday, only three months later, the church held a service for the rededication of the new windows.

Tyler said the flow of money came from an “interfaith community” of donors, many of whom neither shared the race or faith of the historical African American church. Tyler, who would not disclose how much was donated, said that the outpouring of donations reminded him of the biblical story of Moses building a tabernacle and people, who were giving so much support, had to be restrained from giving.

» READ MORE: Mother Bethel AME is vandalized, shattering both windows and peace

On Feb. 19, someone smashed three of the church’s historic stained-glass windows, which date to 1889, when the church was built. There were other incidents of window smashing that morning, including stained-glass windows broken at the National Shrine of St. John Neumann, which is housed in St. Peter the Apostle Church, and the double-paned glass on the front door of InterAct Theater on the 300 block of South Hicks Street.

“It was a pretty hefty rock thrown through [the] front door to shatter both panes,” theater manager Ann Garner said at the time.

Police later charged Haneef Cooper, 39, with the vandalism.

» READ MORE: Northeast Philly man arrested for a string of vandalism that includes Mother Bethel A.M.E. Church

The moral of this story, Tyler insisted, is that a bad moment, an attack on a sacred historical place, in this case, can bring out the best in a community.

The African Methodist Episcopal denomination was formed in 1816 by Philadelphia Preacher Richard Allen, a former enslaved person who also founded Mother Bethel AME Church. The current church, at 419 S. Sixth St. in Society Hill, is on the oldest parcel of land continuously owned by Black people in the U.S., and in 1974 was designated a historic landmark.

A month before the attack, Mother Bethel was awarded a $90,000 grant from the National Trust for Historic Preservation to preserve the windows. Tyler originally thought the church would have to return to the funder to ask for more money to cover the costs of the damage, but the donations made that unnecessary.

Owusu Ansah, a master stained-glass artist, said restoring Mother Bethel’s windows was an uncomplicated project. Tyler said he was surprised that the work was done much faster than he expected.

“This is true,” said Ansah, whose studio is in Germantown. “It was squares and that is the reason I say it was very easy. The windows should last another 100 years.”