Charmira and Quincy Pilgrim wanted to become homeowners a decade ago when they got married.
But over the years, job losses, jobs that didn’t pay enough, children, unpaid maternity leave, and rising costs of living made saving for homeownership impossible.
They were finally able to start putting money away late last year. And this spring, they found a $315,000 house they wanted to buy in West Oak Lane. But they were short thousands of dollars for their down payment and closing costs.
What got them and their five children into their new home was a $10,000 first-time homebuyer grant funded by a group of Quakers in Germantown.
“It was a blessing that I ended up getting the grant because money was tight,” said Charmira, a 32-year-old special-education teacher and case manager.
Up-front cost is a common barrier to homeownership for renters in Philadelphia and across the country. Grants for down payments and closing costs can help aspiring homeowners get in the door. Governments, mortgage lenders, and nonprofits are common funders.
That’s what makes the Pilgrims’ grant stand out. It’s one of five $10,000 grants that Green Street Friends Meeting, a Quaker congregation in Germantown, is funding to help people buy their first homes. It’s part of the congregation’s racial justice plan to redistribute wealth to Black residents in the Germantown area as a form of reparations.
Well that’s just neat.
Build a local community and make the positive changes you want to see.
I think we’ve been conditioned as a county or as a generation or something to take an all or nothing stance with a lot of things.
It’s a lot easier as a white person to say you believe in reparations when Republicans and the Pedophile class rule the country.
But when a random church or neighborhood or whatever form that community finds starts to do it, then it’s a bit harder for your local community to NOT do it (that is, if your local community exists).
Somehow, the Epstein class has found a way to ravage local community, but more importantly, third spaces.
During the early years of Facebook and the likes, really good things happened: sandwich shops that hosted “white pride month celebrations” - closed, Revolution’s happened - a revolutionary named their kid “Facebook” in a way an Americans might name their kid “Freedom”, and Nazis always got dunked on.
At some point the internet kinda proved to be a safe space, trans kids found communities where they could share their experiences. Minority populations found greater community. People found more niched community. That better suited them. It didn’t take long for brands to jump on the bandwagon for gay rights.
Something funny happened at that time though: “I don’t talk politics on Facebook”. Probably coincidentally, that’s around the same time End Shereen rose to prominence. This legitimized Nazism as a political opinion, instead of something that is wrong.
Suddenly, the once open community spaces with local community, vanished. Those that disagreed with societies worst left Facebook for more niche community. Local third places didn’t recover, online third spaces grew.
There’s been a weird push for Christian coffee shops. They do great in every small town. And the town will never call Christianity political. But if a third space opens that slightly supports queer people, or otherwise others, then it WILL become political.
Boycott Christian business. They are pawns for the pedophile class.
Find local community, that slightly supports you - build your community and make them support you. Push the boundaries of what local community can do.
If you do it better than your neighbors, theyll follow. And make a national movement.
The pedophile class learned our playbook, and convinced us not to use it. Take it fucking back.
