A Historic North Carolina Church Gathers After The Storm
Since late last year, Spotlight has enjoyed a content sharing partnership with The Assembly, a new, digital-first magazine in North Carolina that is now producing remarkable coverage of the devastating effects of Hurricane Helene in the state. This story is just one example of the crucial work they are doing and we urge our readers to visit The Assembly’s Helene coverage, which also offers ways to donate time or resources to the recovery from this once-in-a-generation catastrophe.
The Junaluska Gospel Choir band riffed upbeat tunes as congregants of the Boone Mennonite Brethren Church greeted each other and settled into the wooden pews on Sunday morning. It was the first service since Hurricane Helene swept across Western North Carolina, causing widespread flooding and landslides.
The church is in the heart of Junaluska, one of the oldest historically Black communities in Appalachia. This 200-year-old neighborhood is located half a mile up the mountain from downtown Boone. The 100 residents faced floods, sinkholes, dozens of fallen trees, and downed power lines from the storm.
“It’s good to see you this morning because there’s a lot of folks that didn’t wake up today,” Venus Mathes said from the pulpit.
The pearls on her hat caught the sunlight streaming in from the windows as the pastor’s wife addressed the congregation.
“There’s so many stories from this hurricane,” she said. “Kids lost their parents and don’t know where they are, bodies washing up in the water and the mud. People lost their homes.”
The worshippers nodded their heads as they listened, holding their Bibles. The church has about 50 members, but only 25 were able to attend on Sunday. African American heritage hymnals and tithing envelopes were neatly organized in the pews’ racks.
“We know prayer can give and go where we can’t,” she continued. “So we pray for our sisters and brothers, which is what God wants us to do, and we can show love.”
Only two out of four musicians in the church’s band were able to attend—a guitarist and a bassist, who also sang and played the kick drum for the service.
“That’s alright, that’s okay, we’re here to make joyful noise anyway,” said bassist David Brewer.
On the back wall of the sanctuary hangs a community quilt, each of the 49 squares representing a different piece of history and heritage sewn by eight local quilters.
“I love the beach,” wrote Nellie Wellington about the inspiration for one of her squares in the book Junaluska: Oral Histories of a Black Appalachian Community. “After the mountains, it’s the next best place in the world to live. I could live there if it wasn’t for the hurricanes.”
Hurricane Helene caused outages of power, water, cellular, and cable service. Its main artery, Junaluska Road, washed out in several places, leaving only one way to enter and exit the neighborhood. But it was spared the worst.
“We are extremely, extremely blessed,” said community member Lynn Patterson. “I don’t know if it was the elevation or if it was just luck, but I think we did okay. I was grateful to see the lack of damage and that everybody was okay.”
Now, some residents worry that the fact that it didn’t flood many of their homes will only increase pressure from developers in ever-expanding Boone. In the last decade, Appalachian State has expanded and Boone has gained popularity as a vacation destination, increasing development and gentrification pressure in Junaluska.
Patterson said she knows several people who left Junaluska because the cost of living got too high. “I think they would come back if they could afford to,” she said. Many inherited family homes and property in Junaluska, but the costs of maintenance have forced them to sell.
“I’m concerned that they’ll see that we did okay and think, ‘Hey, maybe this is the place to be, this is the land to build on,’” said Patterson, 57. “I’m worried it’s going to have detrimental effects on our community.”
While the community’s population has steadily decreased in recent decades, residents navigate challenges as they always have—together, Pastor Mike Mathes said after the service.
“It’s what we’ve been doing,” he said. “It didn’t take a hurricane, you know? This community is rooted in love. This church has been here over 100 years. Something happens in the community and people just jump in.”
Mathes, who has pastored the church for 10 years, grew up in neighboring Avery County attending Beech Bottom Mennonite Brethren Church. Junaluska’s church is the largest Mennonite congregation in North Carolina, according to the Junaluska Heritage Association. Boone Mennonite Brethren is the only church in Junaluska.
“As Mennonites, we’re passionate people,” Mathes said, gesturing to a line of framed portraits of past ministers. “We’re taught to give.”
In the aftermath of Helene, the church has continued to support its community by hosting a spaghetti dinner, providing fresh vegetables from a local farm, distributing free COVID-19 tests, informing congregants about federal relief, and assisting with voter registration.
“Just the very best of people has been coming out because of the storm,” Patterson said. “I think that’s why I identify as Appalachian because this is who we are. Our response is who we are.”
Patterson, who works as a university program specialist at Appalachian State University, was born and raised in the Boone Mennonite Brethren congregation. Her family can trace their roots here to as early as 1832.
And the church, she said, is “like a second home”–everyone has a key.
After attending N.C. State University in Raleigh, Patterson said she felt “an overwhelming wave of homesickness.” Her uncle, a trucker, picked her up to come back to Boone.
“I remember just being so grateful to see the mountains when I came in,” she said. “He used to say, ‘Well, you need to come home if you’re this heartsick about leaving.’”
The church was built in 1918 by Mennonite missionaries, who constructed churches and orphanages serving African Americans in the region. Some Mennonite churches also acted as schools for Black children who could not attend white schools.
Junaluska’s history and cultural heritage run deep in the church. As the Junaluska Heritage Association describes it, the Sunday services blend Mennonite theology and Baptist worship, replacing more traditional Mennonite hymns with gospel songs led by the church’s Junaluska Gospel Choir.
“During desegregation, I went into a white school in 1965,” Mathes said. “There were only three Black people in the whole school, but I felt no different because I finally got to go to school with my neighbor who lived beside me.”
Community, regardless of identity or background, is a core value of the church, Mathes said: “It doesn’t matter race, creed or color. Jesus can save everybody in this world.”
Russell Shaw has been a member of the church for decades. He moved to Boone in 1974 and visited various churches trying to find a congregation.
“When I got here, I just felt at home,” the retired land surveyor said. “There’s really great people here. They were accepting and kind.”
Patterson said the church suffered some water damage from the floods, but overall the 106-year-old building fared well. This is nothing Junaluska hasn’t seen before, Mathes said.
“We’ve been through a couple of floods, way back in the 1900s,” Mathes said. “But we’re mountain people and we’ll survive this.”
Ella Adams is a Boone-based journalist and editor for The Appalachian. She is an undergraduate anthropology student at Appalachian State University. Her work includes long-form features, narrative journalism, and ethnographic journalism.