South Presbyterian Church Opens 200th Year with Concert for Hope

(Dobbs Ferry, NY, January 3, 2023) Back when Dobbs Ferry was a simple rural village with farms, a tavern, a boat landing and a ferry, a small group of people began meeting in a barn belonging to Peter Van Brugh Livingston, led by a traveling preacher. In 1823, the little congregation incorporated as South Presbyterian Church. This year, South Church marks its 200th anniversary, commemorating “200 Years of Hope Through Service,” the theme of the celebration.

“We stand on the shoulders of our ancestors-in-faith and a long history of justice-seeking as we look to the future, and discern the ways that God is calling us to serve our community now,” said Margery Rossi, minister of South Church.

South Church’s 200th year opens with Concert for Hope. They expect to produce two or three other events throughout the next 12 months —-for children and families, for food lovers and maybe even another music event — all culminating in a gala closing event in February 2024.

Community Event Opens Year-Long Celebration

South Presbyterian Church’s 200th anniversary kicks off on February 4 with Concert for Hope, a community event in the church’s historic sanctuary. The evening includes noshes and cocktails and a performance by celebrated pianist and composer Amir Khosrowpour. “If piano = automobile, then Amir Khosrowpour = Mario Andretti” (TimeOut NY). More / tickets: southpres.org

Described by the Los Angeles Times as having “irresistible verve, unpretentious directness and fingers of steel,” pianist and composer Amir Khosrowpour has astonished audiences around the world as well as at South Church, where he has been Music Director for the past four years.

“If I were to make a word cloud for what South Church means to me,” said Khosrowpour, “I think the biggest words would be community, warmth, care and belonging.”

Celebrating 200 Years of Hope Through Service

The church’s mission for social justice is seen each Wednesday, when the Dobbs Ferry Food Pantry, a coalition of local nonprofits and neighbors initiated and hosted by South Church, regularly serves approximately 100 households.

The church’s sustainability initiative, Roots & Wings, runs a CSA (Community Supported Agriculture) to deliver produce from Hudson Valley farms to Rivertowns’ residents. It has also transformed campus lawns into vegetable and native plant gardens.

In our early years, South was active in the abolitionist movement and in the Civil Rights Movement during Jim Crow Segregation. Church members later protested the War in Vietnam, organized against housing discrimination in the Village of Dobbs Ferry, and founded the Midnight Run. These days, South is dedicated to food security through the Dobbs Ferry Food Pantry.

In more recent years, the church devoted itself to advocating with New Yorkers experiencing homelessness—creating Midnight Run in 1984. That same year, South Church began a long and storied journey as an outspoken proponent of LGBTQ+ rights.

History

South Presbyterian Church was the first church in Dobbs Ferry. Its original location was next to the Little White Cemetery on Ashford Avenue. The present-day church, with a cornerstone dated 1868, is on the National Register of Historic Places. The stone building on the south end of its campus, now Days of Wonder, was the original site of The Masters School.

High on the list of distinguished citizens connected to the church is Theodore Roosevelt who attended South Presbyterian Church in 1871 while vacationing in Dobbs Ferry. His visit is noted on a brass plaque on pew number 59. A few years later, Thornton Wilder, the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of “Our Town,” rode his bicycle around the Manse, his right as the grandchild of Reverend Thornton Niven, the minister of South Presbyterian Church.

Read more here: https://www.southpres.org/about/

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