Wellington Heights pastor builds unity, reconciliation through peace walks

CEDAR RAPIDS — Though the Rev. Keeyon Carter initially moved to Wellington Heights to plant a church, he managed to build a community even before the church had found a building to call home.

Starting the non-denominational Wellington Heights Community Church in March 2020, the former Veritas Church pastor said he wanted the approach to be based in listening to the community — not simply preaching at it.

In the midst of a pandemic and derecho, there were plenty of opportunities to address needs. But in the wake of social unrest after the murder of George Floyd, Carter saw an opportunity for the church to address racial reconciliation and healing at a time many in the community were hurting.

“It wasn’t just us serving them, but the community coming together. There was a real need for racial reconciliation, some guidance,” Carter said. “If the church can’t get racial reconciliation right, we can’t lead out in it. I think that ultimately we need to lead out.”

With a holistic approach to spirituality — a view that spiritual health is connected to all other things — the racial reconciliation piece of the ministry stood out among many churches as racial unrest continued to broil. As some churches sidestepped racial justice or addressed it in vague terms, Carter unabashedly engaged the community in conversations about race “in a way where it brought about justice and mercy” to the marginalized.

Following virtual Bible studies on racial reconciliation and opportunities to mourn after the murder of George Floyd, monthly peace walks sprouted in May 2021 as a new way to bring unlikely people together for a common cause. Each month, the peace walk takes to the streets with a different theme: celebrating the beauty of the community, self care, communal peace, inner peace, restoration, peace in your home.

With each walk, the goal is to restore not just a single part of society, but every part of it, Carter said. Meanwhile, the walks are a physical reminder to the community that peace exists in a neighborhood that sometimes gets a bad rap.

“We want to be a part of bringing unity between race, politics, denominations,” Carter said. “We believe we can be a church that can be a bridge. We felt called to come alongside.”

But building a church can’t come without strengthening and edifying the community it lives in, he said.

“We shouldn’t focus on building the church, but building the community,” Carter said. “If the church flourishes, but the community doesn’t, we don’t consider that a win.”

To that end, Carter has focused on creating shared spaces for those who wouldn’t normally be inclined to associate with each other.

“We’ve seen people from the far right and far left see eye to eye and begin to talk,” Carter said. “For me, it’s not so much being the saviors or having some paternalistic goal. It’s about cultivating an environment where unlikely people who wouldn’t likely share a space now share a space. They’re at the table and talking.”

In addition to the peace walk, the church-led Wellington Heights Neighborhood Engagement Program, funded by the Greater Cedar Rapids Community Foundation, helps ensure families have needs met at home. Through a grant, the program supports 15 families by engaging them in mutually-beneficial relationships with volunteers that help fill family needs and meet family goals, from fixing broken things around the house to going to therapy.

A Waterloo native and graduate of Iowa State University, Carter started to feel a calling to grassroots ministry in 2013. Carter and his wife moved to Wellington Heights after asking city residents to name a neighborhood people don’t speak well of. Carter pastored at Veritas in downtown Cedar Rapids from 2017 to 2020 and currently is attending Fuller Theological Seminary.

“We didn’t move here because we thought we were going to be saviors. We find that places like this are safe shelters — that that’s where God is,” he explained. “There’s so much we can learn from.”

In places often tormented by injustice, the couple feels called to minister alongside people. Most of that help, the pastor said, simply comes by embracing and empowering the gifts already in the community.

“When people are coming together for the values of peace, justice, mercy and reconciliation, those are the things of God,” Carter said. “As a pastor, those are taking steps toward the way of God. It’s a beautiful thing to be part of the community.”

The results of unity alone, produced in part through Carter’s efforts, have paid dividends.

“We’ve made some great strides, but we have a lot of work to do,” he said.

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