Fr. Charles Myers and Monique Myers at St. John the Baptist Community Health Fair, Fr. Charles Myers with Fire Chief Freddie Stevenson at the Washington Shores Elementary School Great American Teach In Nov. 16, 2021

Black history is not just a month at St. John the Baptist, Orlando, but an everyday living reality. Our church is the historic Black civil rights church in the Diocese of Central Florida. We celebrate The Rev. Canon Nelson W. Pinder, who pastored our church and helped lead the civil rights movement in the 1960s and ’70s. We celebrate Mable Butler, the first Black female Orlando City commissioner and Orange County commissioner. We also celebrate Freddie Stevenson, Orange County’s first Black fire chief.

There are many stories like these at our church, which is rooted in civil rights and committed to community rights. This year, in honor of National Black HIV/AIDS Awareness Day and Black History Month, we hosted the St. John the Baptist Community Health Fair on Saturday, Feb. 9, under the leadership of Monique Myers and our Social Concern Team.

Our health fair hosted many vendors who came to serve our community. We offered free COVID and HIV testing along with resources to help our elderly neighbors. Dr. John Robertson, a psychologist as well as the president of the Canon Nelson W. Pinder Union of Black Episcopalians Chapter of Central Florida, provided mental health resources. We also gave away food through our church food pantry, helped with job resources, and our nursing community performed blood pressure checks for our neighbors to promote health and wholeness.

Monique Myers, community outreach manager, pointed out that Black History Month includes not just remembering the past and investing in the present but also leaving a legacy for the future: “Celebrating Black History Month through our Community Health Fair helps to extend our legacy of outreach and highlights our commitment to holistic health,” she said. “We will always be a church committed to sharing the love of Jesus to our community, and one of the ways we do that is through serving our marginalized communities and sharing resources with them that extend beyond their spiritual needs.”

Therefore, our church is “The New Old St. John’s – a Forerunner in Kingdom Innovation.”