A Methodist Camp Became a Shelter, a Freeport Church a Kitchen for 750 Meals a Day After Dorian

• Hurricane Dorian left an estimated 76,000 people homeless in The Bahamas, according to the UN
• Bahamas Methodist Habitat opened its Camp Symonette in Eleuthera as a shelter
• St Paul’s Methodist Church in Freeport served about 750 meals a day
• UMCOR sent solidarity grants to Methodist partners for relief and recovery

When Hurricane Dorian tore through Grand Bahama and Abaco in September 2019, Methodist property in The Bahamas was put to work almost immediately. An October 2019 report from Global Ministries, the United Methodist mission agency, described how church buildings became shelters and kitchens.

On Eleuthera, Bahamas Methodist Habitat activated Camp Symonette, its volunteer camp, as a shelter on 6 September. It first took in 32 evacuees and eventually served 76, under the direction of the Rev Stephanie Gottschalk. On Grand Bahama, St Paul’s Methodist Church, led by superintendent the Rev Kenneth Lewis, served “750 meals per day” along with care packages, diapers, water and hygiene items, and later worked with Freeport schools to feed 600 students daily.

The scale of need was vast. The death toll had passed 60, and the United Nations estimated that 76,000 people had been left homeless. An oil storage facility in East Grand Bahama leaked 1.5 million gallons of crude. UMCOR, the United Methodist Committee on Relief, awarded solidarity grants to Methodist partners in The Bahamas for emergency relief and recovery.

Other church leaders named in the report included Carla Culmer, president of the Bahamas Conference of the Methodist Church, and Bishop Theophilus Rolle.

For Jamaica, the lesson is that church property is part of a nation’s disaster infrastructure. A camp built for mission teams became a shelter; a church kitchen became a feeding centre for hundreds. Jamaican churches that own halls, camps or retreat centres can plan now for how those buildings would be used after a hurricane, from water storage and generators to insurance that covers use as a shelter. After Hurricane Melissa, churches that have planned ahead are well placed to be a first line of help.

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