That Rev. Calvin Butts, leader of Harlem’s Abyssinian Church, had a clear path to political power but chose not to take it was just one of the extraordinary things about him
“We do not sprinkle at the Abyssinian Church,” the deacon said proudly. “You will be held underwater until you are fully submerged.” This was an important but unnecessary reminder to me and a half-dozen other men, wearing little more than white smocks and socks, who were about to be baptized by the Reverend Calvin Butts.
This happened in the early 1990s, only a few years after Butts had officially become pastor of Abyssinian. His recent death at 73 from pancreatic cancer, much too soon, leaves our city without one of its finest preachers and steadiest leaders. . “I thought I did. I could be the mayor … shucks, I could be the governor. Man, might as well shoot for the big time: I could be the president,” he said. “But I never could find that fire. In the house of God, the beauty of the Lord, the love of God’s people — this is where I’m refreshed.”
“Beloved, the most powerful movement that we are going to make today is when we decide that even more enthusiastically and aggressively, we take this gospel into the streets of New York City. The mayor, God bless him, is doing all he can — but the mayor is not going to be able to solve this violence problem just by locking people up. He’s not going to be able to do it. It’s not going to work,” Butts said in May. “What our young men and women need is a standard by which to live.
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