You are here: Home > News > The Harvest November/December 2006 > St. David's fire

	Firefighters cut holes in the roof of St. David's, Topeka, to vent smoke trapped inside the church during an arson fire that struck the building Nov. 10. The church and adjacent chapel will have to be torn down as a result of structural damage from the fire's extreme temperatures. --Photos by Melodie Woerman

Arson fire to claim St. David's building

By Melodie Woerman
Editor, The Harvest

Fire, it turns out, can be very deceptive. Just hours after it was struck by an arsonist in the early morning of Nov. 10, St. David’s, Topeka, didn’t appear to have suffered catastrophic damage. The chapel where the fire started was a mess, but the church walls were still standing, the roof was mostly intact, and the pews were in place, with damp and smoky Hymnals and Prayer Books neatly arranged in their racks.

What wasn’t visible, though, was the structural damage caused by the extreme heat inside the building — heat that reached more than 1,000 degrees, according to fire investigators.

With the support structures inside the walls and roof so badly damaged, there was only one thing to do: make the sad but realistic determination that the building would have to be torn down.

That word went out to parishioners a week after the fire. The church, chapel and sacristy all would have to be demolished, and the stained glass windows also would be lost. They, too, fell victim to the heat, with the glass melted paper-thin in spots.

The church’s 26-year-old tracker organ, specially made for its spot in the choir loft at the back of the church, also was destroyed, its metal pipes evaporated by the heat and its wood frame left in splinters. There is hope repairs can save the church’s signature Christus Rex, a 15-foot-tall sculpture of the risen Christ on a cross depicted wearing a priest’s Eucharistic vestments. Made of bronze with inlaid mosaic tiles, it will be removed and handed over to restoration experts.

Fire officials estimated the damage to the building and its contents at $2.5 to $3 million. Insurance should cover it all, officials with the Church Insurance Company said.

	Firefighters in breathing gear wait for smoke to be released from the church so they can fight the fire.

Investigation continues
Fire investigators say their search for the arsonist continues, with leads coming in daily. “We are following leads as they develop,” said James Vollintine, an investigator with the Topeka Fire Department. “It’s an active and ongoing investigation.”

Vollintine said his department is joined in the investigation by the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, as well as the Kansas State Fire Marshal’s Office. ATF is involved with all church fires in the United States, according to an agent who was on the scene of the fire just hours afterward.

Topeka fire and police officials took the unusual step of seeking leads by handing out fliers Nov. 15 to motorists at the intersection where St. David’s stands. Vollintine said they hoped that busy location might yield some information. “With the amount of traffic that goes through that intersection, someone might have seen something,” he said.

Smoke pours from the roof
The fire began sometime between the evening of Nov. 9 and the early morning hours of Nov. 10. Fire officials arrived on the scene shortly after 5:10 a.m. in response to 911 calls. Early reports indicate the fire was started in a stack of books in the chapel, which for years has been kept unlocked. The fire apparently traveled up the wood wall that separates the chapel from the nave and into the ceiling, where it ran the length of the building.

When firefighters arrived they had difficulty attacking the fire because of heavy smoke inside the church. Using chain saws and axes, they cut holes in the roof to act as vents. The smoke then poured from the roof and curled out from under the eaves. At one point small flames appeared through those holes as firefighters doused the blaze inside with water and foam.

Several dozen members of the parish, along with the rector, the Rev. Don Davidson, and Deacon Harry Craig, gathered across the street to watch the scene. Capital City Bank opened their vestibule to provide protection from the cold and later invited clergy, parishioners and fire officials inside for coffee and to use the phone and meeting rooms.

Davidson received regular updates from fire officials and then relayed information to anxious members.

By 7:30 a.m. Bishop Dean Wolfe had arrived to provide help and spiritual support. He and Canon to the Ordinary Mary Siegmund comforted parishioners and conferred with fire officials. The bishop led those gathered in a time of prayer and offered words of reassurance to them.

Pointing across the street to the smoking structure he said, “This is our house, but it is not our home. It is our building, but we are the church.” He encouraged people to “lean on each other and on God” in the coming weeks and said, “We are going to be different, and by God’s grace we are going to be better.”

It took about four hours to extinguish the fire. More than 80 firefighters were involved, along with 14 fire trucks and engines from two fire departments.

Services on schedule
Within hours, the congregation made plans for services the following Sunday. On Nov. 12 about 350 people crowded into Faith Lutheran Church, St. David’s across-the-street neighbor, to hear Davidson and Bishop Wolfe tell them that the congregation will rebuild and will be stronger for the trials they will endure.

“If we build it, they will come,” Davidson said in his sermon, quoting from the movie Field of Dreams. He asked people to look at their hands, saying, “These hands of ours have been about the business these past few days of saying good-bye to a precious part of our parish, but not our church. We have been wiping our tears and grieving and remembering what has happened there.”

He called the congregation to continue to spread the message of the gospel while they rebuild. “Baptisms, weddings, funerals, everything else you can imagine, we’re going to continue right on doing,” he said. “They don’t need a building, they need our hands.”

After the service dozens of people crossed the street to peek into open doors at St. David’s building to see the damage for themselves. Safety concerns kept them outside but allowed them a look into the narthex and the chapel.

Members shook their heads in disbelief, commenting on the strong smell of smoke that still hung in the air. Children walked through the yard gathering scorched pages of music that had floated outside.

Life goes on
After one week at Faith Lutheran and another at a local Masonic lodge, the congregation has settled into a schedule that senior warden Margaret Telthorst says will last for the foreseeable future.

The Wednesday evening healing service has relocated to nearby First Congregational Church, and the 5 p.m. Saturday service takes place in the chapel at Grace Cathedral. Sunday services at 8 a.m. and 10:30 a.m., with breakfast and education classes in between, are at Temple Beth Shalom, the Jewish temple located about five blocks north of St. David’s. Christmas services will be there, too.

While the congregation has to bring in everything it needs for worship, Telthorst said they are beginning to establish a routine, aided by the return of familiar vestments and communion vessels from the company that had been cleaning them.

“The surroundings are different,” she said, “but there is the sense that this is St. David’s.”

An office has been set up in a house that the church owns next door, and the rhythm of parish life continues. Telthorst said the annual stewardship campaign has gone on as scheduled, with pledges showing an overall increase. Attendance is up, too.

She said most people are adjusting to life without their beloved church building. The first service at Faith Lutheran was key to moving forward, she said, “not staying back in the fire.”

That process also was helped when about 100 parishioners gathered for what essentially was a wake in the house-turned-parish office the evening of the fire and the next afternoon. They grieved, cried, hugged and came together as a parish family, Telthorst said, and by Sunday were ready to hear the message that the church isn’t the building but the people.

While the church portion of the building awaits demolition sometime in the next few months — once all the insurance claims are settled, Davidson said — repairs are happening in the offices, parish hall and classrooms. Ceiling tiles stained with smoke have been ripped out everywhere, and walls will need cleaning or repainting.

Telthorst said the congregation has been overwhelmed by all the help it has received. Nearby churches of varying denominations have donated supplies and offered prayers in support of St. David’s.

The parish also has received more than $30,000 from parishes and individuals across the Diocese of Kansas in response to Bishop Wolfe’s creation of a “St. David’s Resurrection Fund” to help with fire-related expenses. “The outpouring of support from the Episcopal family has been phenomenal,” Telthorst said.

All that has helped the parish begin to look toward the future. “It has been like a death,” Telthorst said, “but life goes on. We are in the life-going-on phase.”