CANADIAN DIASPORAN AFRICANS IN MINISTRY TOGETHER
It was a very pleasant evening on Friday, August 13, 2010, when delegates to the 157th annual meeting of
the African United Baptist Association (AUBA) started boarding buses for their journey. They had just finished
eating grilled hamburgers and vegetables during a concert on the lawns of Bridgetown Jubilee Park in Nova
Scotia, Canada. Soon, they would be in the Valleyview Provincial Park.
Once called Granville Mountain, Valleyview is the place where Richard Preston gathered persons who
were formerly enslaved in America to form the AUBA. The journey to the inaugural meeting place of the AUBA
was a mountainside climb with exquisite views below. The outstanding work of David George and Richard
Preston made this journey possible.
David George, who was born in Essex County, Virginia, fled from a slave plantation making his way to
Georgia. While there, he came to faith and preached at Silver Bluff Church in South Carolina where he was
pastor in the 1770s. In 1782, George fled with British loyalists to Nova Scotia.
Once in Nova Scotia, he set about establishing Baptist witness among the people of African descent
residing in the area. These Blacks were not welcome in the existing Baptist churches in the province.
Eventually, in 1792, George left Nova Scotia for Sierra Leone where he established a settlement and started
Baptist work.
Richard Preston also lived in Virginia where, like his parents, he was enslaved. In 1816, he made his way
to Canada in hopes of finding his mother who had fled to that country in search of freedom. Soon, Preston
found his mother and settled in Nova Scotia. Preston received assistance, enabling him to train for the
Christian ministry in England. Upon his return to Nova Scotia, he established eleven Baptist churches across
Nova Scotia.
On September 1, 1854, Preston gathered the people under his leadership at Granville Mountain to form
what is now the AUBA. He did not live to see his dream of freedom for the enslaved come to reality. He died in
1861. However, the work of this man, who formed the African Abolition Society and worked hard for Canadians
to understand the heinous nature of slavery, was not in vain. His outstanding legacy as church planter and
liberation worker endures.
From the mountainside above Bridgetown, Nova Scotia, the gathering at Valleyview looked out over
the region below and, with help from a simple, but richly textured liturgy, they were transported to the day
when the AUBA was founded. They rejoiced with singing, quietness, and prayer. They also dedicated a
carefully prepared interpretive panel which was set up on the site as a permanent reminder of the day of their
beginnings as Baptist people of African origin working together in Nova Scotia.
When the delegates assembled for the plenary sessions of their AUBA annual meeting, BWA General
Secretary Neville Callam and Peter Parris, outstanding son of the AUBA and emeritus professor of Princeton
Theological Seminary, addressed them. The speakers celebrated the historic achievements of the AUBA in
which people of the African Diaspora – from North America and the Caribbean, and from such African countries
as Zambia, Congo, Cameroon, Ghana, Liberia and Nigeria – are united with white Canadians in one Baptist
association which is a part of the Convention of Atlantic Baptist Churches.
Alma Johnston, moderator of the AUBA, presided gracefully over the proceedings of the conference in
which many other female AUBA leaders and pastors participated with distinction. The meetings were rich with
choral music, drama and times for reflections.
Playing host for the conference was the Inglewood Baptist Church which has a membership of less than
25. The signs of careful planning, good order, and gracious hospitality justified the risky decision to allow this
small church, led by Pastor Cathy Batson, to host the historic meeting. AUBA leaders could have selected
a large AUBA Baptist church as the venue for the historic event. The choice of Inglewood was a sign of the
confident way in which the members of the AUBA are intent on going forward in ministry together.
PHOTO: BWA General Secretary Neville Callam with African United Baptist Association leaders who were dedicated
at Valleyview in Bridgetown, Nova Scotia

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