Decades Later, Sisters Never Miss a Sunday

Rural Loudoun Church With Deep History Leans On Pastor, Four Siblings For Success

By Bill Snead

Sunday, July 15, 2007

Church services at the First Baptist Church-Watson are still minutes away and Betty Banks, 77, looks fidgety. After a round of hellos and hugs when she arrived, she sat quietly by herself in a front pew, an idle tambourine in her lap.

Today, she’s wearing a straight black dress, a small black veiled hat and a big smile.

Deacon Lee Banks (no relation to Betty) stands and invites the small congregation to open its Bibles to the book of Samuel. The faint rustle of tissue-thin pages sounds like dry leaves moving through the sanctuary. As Deacon Banks reads, the quiet moment is gone and the air is filled with phrases like, "'Thank you Lord' ... 'well, well, well' ... 'ummmmm, yes Lord and help us Lord.'"



As the passage from Samuel winds down, Betty heads for the front of the church and picks up a wireless microphone. She asks everyone to turn to page 480 in their hymnal and sing, "I'm On the Battlefield of the Lord."

Betty is joined at the altar by fellow deacons Banks and Francis Wilson.

Betty loves to sing. Singing makes her happy. And, right now she's ready to get happy.

The rhythmic slapping of the tambourine against Betty’s leg sets the tempo as Sunday’s worshippers – who have risen to their feet – join the trio. Most don’t need hymnals. They know the song by heart.

Their third and final hymn, "Oh Magnify the Lord," incites hand-clapping and "amens," and inspires Betty to say a few words.

She thanked the Lord for allowing her to wake up this morning.

"My friend didn’t wake up one day last week and she'll be funeralized later this week." Still smiling, she adds, "I'm not going to sit down on my Lord. I’m standing up here to thank him out loud for all the good things he’s done for us over the years."

Four Sisters, One Church

Betty's three sisters are in church today. It would be news if they weren’t. Rosetta Bush, 77, and Viola Jeffries, 81, sit in the front row across the aisle from Betty. Another sister, Bernice Scott, 73, is in her usual spot at the back of the meetinghouse.

The church, at 40391 Red Hill Road south of Leesburg, and the dirt road out front have been important pieces of the sisters’ lives.

In 1896, their grandfather, Samuel Thornton, donated the acreage where the first church was built. He’s buried “out back,” which is how the sisters refer to the church’s cemetery. He's joined by their parents, grandparents, brothers, husbands, great-grandparents, nieces and nephews, all buried in the cinnamon-colored soil.

The cemetery has few large tombstones. Many of the headstones are handmade from concrete with names and dates inscribed by hand before the cement hardened.

The sisters were born about two miles up the road in Watson, an area settled by freed slaves before the Civil War. There never has been a town called Watson -- only a general store with a post office.

The First Baptist Church-Watson minister is Eddie Patten.

"You know, this church has been here for a long time and the geography has changed a lot around here," he said. "We're surrounded by some very expensive real estate."

Patten said the church's neighbors wave as they pass by but none drop by for a visit.

"They’re probably driving 45 minutes to their church, just like I do," he said, referring to his commute from Alexandria.

The nearby tree-covered rise on the horizon used to be called Negro Mountain. It's now referred to as Red Hill Mountain, probably because of the soil’s color.

A History in Watson

As small children the sisters walked the two miles to church barefoot with their mother, Sarah Thornton. Their father, Makel Thornton, a farm laborer, went to church "when the spirit moved him," Rosetta said.

Monday through Friday, their Baptist church doubled as a one-room grade school for black children, handling grades one through seven.

"There weren’t any buses," Betty said, laughing. "Our feet was the school bus."

"On Friday at the end of the school day we stacked our desks in a corner to be out of the way for Sunday church and on Monday we'd set them in rows for school," Rosetta recalled.

They remembered their first teacher was Charlie Willis, who lived in nearby Aldie.

"If you got caught chewing gum in class," Viola said, "you had to write 'I will not chew gum in class.' I don’t know how many times, but a lot."

She said if a student hadn’t finished a penance by the end of school, he or she stayed and kept writing.

They'd buy their gum with the pennies they got selling pop bottles they’d find along the road.

On Dec. 1, 1941, the four sisters were baptized in nearby Goose Creek.

"You better believe it was cold," Rosetta said, waving a finger. "A white family who my mother cleaned for let us use their house to change into dry clothes."

The young girls walked back to church to finish their baptism process.

The sisters faced a problem when the time came for them to attend junior high and high school. The nearest high school for blacks was in Manassas – some 20 miles from their home. They were in their 50s and 60s when they received GEDs after going to night school in Falls Church.

'He's Fired Up, Really Feeling It'

With the preliminaries out of the way, Patten approached the podium. His welcoming voice is soft but firm. His expression looks like he's about to say something interesting, insightful, compelling or funny. And in a short time, there will be no need for the electronic sound system.

"We're asking that you hear our cries for our sisters and brothers in the need of prayer ... using us as only you know how ... come into our house and sanctify whatever is not in place and abide beside us."

He continued, "You are Alpha and Omega. You can start it and You can finish it ... that is the glory of Jesus Christ."

As his scriptless sermon continues, the congregation punctuates Patten's remarks with praises to God and Jesus. In a short time it becomes obvious that Patten is a man who enjoys his work.

"We're having a party in church but it's nothing but a Holy Ghost party ... You've got one purpose when you walk through these doors and that's just to serve God ... If we don't ever serve another chicken dinner in this church, God will still be here," Patten said.

Laughter filled the church.

"Don't run up on God like I'm one of your boys … pride brings about destruction ... some mortals will say 'My father owns these parts or this town’ and Jesus can say 'it's my father who owns these parts.' Don't get into genealogy with the Lord."

He's been preaching for an hour. Some of his audience of about 25 people stand while clapping and others are rocking in their seats. Nobody is having trouble staying awake.

Patten jabs the air with his fists, he smiles, he laughs and he pounds on any flat surface available to him. He's also serious, articulate, and sometimes he's right out funny.

"If you're waiting until tomorrow to serve God," he said, "you'd better realize that tomorrow may not come, so you'd better shout and dance right now. If he's comin' to take me today, he'll take me with a dance in my body and he'll take me with a shout in my mouth and a praise on my lips. This is not about anybody else, not your momma or your daddy,” he shouts to his flock. "It's all about you and me."

Beads of sweat are trickling down his face. He wipes them away with a purple towel.

"Give him the glory, all the glory. Just bring your wretched self through these doors," he said. "No, you say, you've got no problems, just unpaid bills, your car doesn't work, your child is bad, that's all. When you say everything is just fine and dandy, you're lying to God. You being here is the sacrifice to Jesus, your gift to God, your body, the living sacrifice.”

Lowering his voice and smiling, Patten said, "I'm trying to hurry up ... I promise I'll finish in five minutes."

Church member Tori Nelson, who lives 10 miles away in Ashburn, knows better.

"When he says five minutes it means 35 minutes or more, but that's fine with us," she said. "You can tell when he's fired up ... that's when he's really feeling it, but you can understand him and no matter what he says you can go back and check it in the Bible and there it is," she said, laughing.

Tori and her husband, Don, began attending Patten's church after hearing him preach at their former church in Aldie.

"I could understand him on my level," she said.

After the church services, Patten talked about First Baptist Church-Watson and his goals for the church.

"This church has a wonderful history and the four sisters are a large part of it," he said. "They help so many people in our community and just being around these ladies, we’ve all learned a lot."

'God Is the Same In a Small Church'

Patten, 39, a veteran U.S. Marine, works in Washington to help with the U.S. Department of Defense’s Base Realignment and Closure, which determines the value of military bases across the country. He lives in Alexandria and has been the church’s pastor for two and a half years.

Patten grew up Catholic in Landover, in Prince George's County.

"Yeah," he says, laughing, "Until I was 18, I was confirmed in Woodmore Church in Bowie, the works."

He joined the Marine Corps when he was 17. He was transferred often and said he picked up the Baptist faith in Yuma, Ariz., when he was 21 years old.

"I can remember someone saying I'd be a preacher some day and it made me back off a little," he said. "I got the calling in 1991 and I made a few changes in my life ... I wasn't a bad kid and I wasn't the best kid."

He said his major goals are to reach out in Loudoun County and to spiritually strengthen the church.

"I think getting people involved, getting some fresh individuals into the church -- not necessarily younger or older -- and to cross gender, racial and ethnic barriers is a big challenge to us," he said.

He said the church already has moved in that direction, referring to the non-blacks who attend church services regularly.

"I love preaching and I love talking about Jesus," he said.

First Baptist Church-Watson has 39 members with 19 worshippers coming to services regularly.

"God is the same in a small church as he is in a big church. You don't have to join a church. You are the church and we do whatever we have to do to be ready for tomorrow -- and tomorrow is already here," he said. "And we come to Jesus just as we are and we give the glory and the honor to his name."

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