BETHANY COMMUNITY MINISTRIES
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Mission Statement
Our Mission is to strengthen, equip and encourage the Homewood community with hope by providing human services, youth ministry, counseling and education as a tangible expression of God’s love. Our Vision – Diakonia Ministries is committed to seeing the Homewood community experience spiritual, emotional, physical, educational and economic growth.
About This Cause
Bethany Community Ministries (BCM), formerly known as Diakonia Ministries (DM), is a 501(c) 3 nonprofit organization founded in 2000, vision of Dr. William R. Glaze, Pastor, and the leadership of Bethany Baptist Church. As the outreach arm of Bethany Baptist Church, it supports a variety of volunteer-run initiatives and manages others described below. Bethany Community Ministries was formed to be a transformational ministry by providing services that would meet the spiritual, emotional and physical needs of the people living in the Homewood neighborhood of the City of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. The neighborhood surrounding Bethany Baptist Church had been allowed to decay and drugs, alcohol and chronic poverty had taken its toll. Pastor Glaze envisioned a place for the congregation to reach out in service to a suffering urban neighborhood. In 1999, church leadership initiated a fundraising campaign, called “A Time to Soar” and raised $400,000 from this inner-city congregation of 350 members to build a community center. This act demonstrated the commitment the congregation made to stay and to serve the residents of Homewood-Brushton. In 2000 we opened the doors of BETHANY CENTER, the home of Bethany Community Ministries, a beautiful three level facility with 17 classrooms and offices, a kitchen, a fellowship hall and a multi-purpose gym. Bethany Community Ministries as effectively developed partnerships, energizing others in the greater Pittsburgh community to create long-term commitments to Homewood, which will bring needed transformation. Bethany Community Ministries currently provides services through the following programs: 1. Bethany Summer Youth Program (BSYP) dedicated to the strengthening of the greater community by providing children ages 4-12, of Homewood-Brushton and surrounding communities, an opportunity to develop morally, physically and spiritually in a safe, caring, and intellectually stimulating environment. 2. The Master’s Kitchen provides a nutritious lunch every Friday afternoon to all who come with the objective of helping to end hunger in the Homewood-Brushton community. The Bethany Food Pantry also provides nutritious food to the community on the 2nd Saturday of each month. 3. The Turn*Around Agenda (TTA), serves our community school Pittsburgh Faison K-5, by nurturing a wholesome educational environment with committed volunteers. TTA recruits in-school volunteers who provide supportive services like tutoring, reading support and other duties. We also secure needed resources to fulfill unmet classroom needs like dictionaries and alarm clocks for each family, to see every student can maximize their potential for learning. 4. The Shawl Project, a ministry of women creating hand crafted blankets, afghans, prayer shawls, quilts and other practical and useful items for nursing home residents, the homeless and others in need of an expression of our love. The ministry provides learning opportunities in the areas of fiber arts, crochet, knit, quilting and provides opportunities, Knit the Bridge and the Pittsburgh Creative Arts Festival, to collaborate building relationships throughout the region. 5. Soul Fit Workouts offers low impact exercises for every fitness level every Saturday morning at 10:00 am via ZOOM due to the pandemic 6. The LAMP Program (Learning Assistance and Mentoring Partnerships) this partnership with Family Guidance and the Homewood Brushton Community Ministries provides in and out of school mentors for children attending the Pittsburgh Faison K-5. 7. The BCM Homewood Senior Care Coordination Program (SCC) was specifically designed to address the gaps in critical care (medical and non-medical) of senior citizens living in the marginalized communities of Homewood and Allegheny County. The BCM service model recognizes the importance of coordinating onsite influenza community vaccine clinics for a majority of black and brown marginalized senior residents living in congregate housing - public housing, high rises and larger apartment complexes with shared communal spaces. In the wake of the COVID pandemic and because influenza and COVID-19 share many symptoms, BCM immediately pivoted to coordinating both influenza and COVID-19 onsite vaccination clinics for the senior population. The COVID-19 pandemic has had a catastrophic impact on the black and brown senior population, resulting in excess death rates within Allegheny County and throughout the United States. Since the onset of the BCM_SSC program in December 2020, BCM has coordinated over 2,200 vaccinations in onsite congregate housing and community clinics. BCM has established a vaccine planning and coordination team within the influenza and COVID-19 response structure. Together they represent subject matter experts in immunizations, community outreach preparedness, equity, and communications. We reach out to providers identified by local health jurisdictions, pharmacies, equity partners, professional health care associations, coalitions, and community organizations. This grassroots outreach is desperately needed to increase the uptake of COVID-19 vaccinations in the Black community and counteract vaccine misinformation and hesitancy.