c. 1996 Religion News Service

WASHINGTON (RNS)-Five of the nation’s largest black church groups have announced the creation of a company that will help businesses sell a variety of consumer products and services to congregation members while earmarking part of the profits to help African-Americans buy their own homes.

The denominations chose the birth date of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. to unveil their ambitious plan to channel some of the $400 billion annually spent by African-American consumers back into the black community.”Dr. King wanted the African-American community to move beyond civil rights to silver rights,”the Rev. Bennett W. Smith., president of the 1.8 million-member Progressive National Baptist Convention, said Monday.”We feel we are in some degree helping today to fulfill that dream.” Revelation Corp. of America, a for-profit company, will give a variety of firms, selling everything from automobile supplies to groceries to insurance, an exclusive track to reaching the five denominations’ estimated 20 million members.

In return, the firms will give church members large discounts on the consumer goods and services, and provide rebates to the denominations. The denominations will then invest a portion of those rebates to fund housing construction and underwrite mortgages for African-Americans.

In addition to the Progressive Baptists, the denominations involved are: the African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church, the Christian Methodist Episcopal Church, the National Baptist Convention of America and the National Baptist Convention USA, the nation’s largest African-American church group with 8.5 million members.

About 70 percent of Revelation-named after the New Testament book that envisions the Kingdom of God-will be owned by the denominations. The rest will be owned by a firm controlled by John B. Lowery, a Memphis, Tenn., businessman credited with making Revelation a reality and putting up most of the project’s seed money. He will also run Revelation.

The denominations will receive about 70 percent of the rebates-expected to average about 5 percent of the annual sales of the consumer goods and services. Seventy percent of what the denominations receive will go into a national housing fund. Ten percent will go into pension funds for the denominations’ ministers, and 20 percent will go directly to the congregations whose members make the purchases.

Lowery said he expects Revelation to generate about $100 million in sales its first year, which would mean about $5 million in total rebates-including $3.5 million to the denominations.

Smith said the”crux of the plan as far as the churches are concerned is to make housing available for African-Americans who today find themselves unfairly discriminated against in the housing market.” National housing fund monies, he said, will be made available to African- Americans in the form of home construction and mortgage loans on single- and multi-family homes and industrial and church buildings.

Philadelphia, Chicago, Memphis, Tenn., Atlanta, New Orleans, Charlotte, N.C., Richmond, Va., Detroit and Tallahassee, Fla., are the first cities in which Revelation will invest in construction loans.

Smith said that because blacks are turned down for mortgages more often than whites, Revelation’s lending guidelines will be more lenient than those of most mortgage companies.”Each of the church groups involved has long sought to help economically empower African-Americans by allowing them to own their own homes. We felt that if we got together to do this on a larger scale, we could make a greater impact,”he added.

Lowery, who is white, formerly was staff director for Rep. Harold E. Ford, D-Tenn., who is black. It was while working for Ford that Lowery said he first envisioned the Revelation concept. He likened Revelation to the sort of sales operation run by the American Association of Retired Persons, which helps selected companies pitch their products to AARP members in return for large discounts.

Starting April 1, the churches will begin distributing coupons to be used when making purchases. A toll-free number-800-893-5555-will also be set up to allow for catalog purchases.

Lowery declined Monday to name the firms that will be marketing their products and services through Revelation. He said their names would be released within 90 days.

MJP END RIFKIN