WOMEN OF WESTERN NEW YORK

An Interview with Reverend Sharon Baugh:
Checking Our Moral Compass
Reverend Sharon Baugh is most definitely a woman to watch. A Buffalo native, mother and Pastor of
St. Mark A.M.E. Zion Church, Rev. Baugh offers a unique perspective on the state of our imperfect
union, amongst other things, through words of wisdom, peace, and direction in a new age.
Here, Reverend Baugh discusses the deterioration and growth of the church, the effect of capitalism
on marriage, Hillary Clinton’s race to the Oval, and much more.
Being Called to Teach
JJ: Sharon, that’s a Biblical name, right? Were you named after a prominent female
figure in the Bible?
Rev. Baugh: “No, I think my parents just named me Sharon because they liked it.” (laughter)
“Actually my parents are originally from the south. Rome, GA. And when they came up here
looking for work --like most people did in the 50’s-- there was a minister named Rev. Otis
Vaughn, who started a church, and he used to run with my grandfather. That’s when they used
to drink in the clubs and all that kind of stuff. So when he started this storefront church here in
Buffalo, he asked my mother, because he knew my grandfather, to be a part of that. It was called
A.M.E. Zion Church.
Rev. Vaughn, my father, my mother and my aunt were founding members of that church. And so
I was born into the church. When I was 6, it moved to 1301 Genesee St. where they purchased
a formal building. It was there that I began to love the Lord; I began to love teaching; but, more
than anything else, I loved the community of church.
JJ: And you knew that at age 6?
Rev. Baugh: “Well, yea, . . . I grew up in it. At the age of 10, that was really impressed
upon me. But, unfortunately, by the time I got to be a teenager, the church had started to
deteriorate. The church no longer had its large youth population, no longer viable the
way it once was, and so by the time I was 16, I was Superintendent of Sunday School at
the church. I ran it, not because people saw anything special in me, per se, but I think
it was my willingness to work.
As I got into my 40’s, I started hearing a call on my life to preach. People out of the
Sharon Baugh
Pastor of St. Mark A.M.E. Zion Church
by: Jamella James, JD
blue asking me . . . one time, we had an Evangelist come to A.M.E. Zion Church, she came
down off the pulpit, she looked at me and said, ‘you know you’re called to preach.’ So I’ve had
several confirmations that the Lord was calling me to preach.”
Ordained to Preach
JJ: Let’s fast forward to the church you are pastor of now, St. Mark A.M.E. Zion. What’s
the community like over there in Lackawanna?
Rev. Baugh: “I’m blessed in one sense that I don’t have a lot of drama issues, because I have small
a congregation; they love each other, and they’ll do whatever they can for the church. But, the
church at one time had 350 general claimants, or full active members, beyond visitors. That was
tied to the fact that many of the congregants were the men who worked at Bethlehem Steel and
women who were stay at home moms. They had daycare there, and ministries there, the church
was doing extremely well. But when Bethlehem Steel went down, the city took a huge blow and
so did the church. Now that I’m there, I have real hope that the church will reemerge.”
JJ: You have a secular 40hr/week job. Would you like to make preaching your only job?
Rev. Baugh: “That is the ideal choice, but St. Mark’s is not in a position to pay a full-time salary.”
JJ: Pastors get paid?
Rev. Baugh: “Pastors get paid. Pastors have to eat. They have to have shelter. It’s the church’s
responsibility to take care of the Pastor and his or her family. St. Mark has not been in that
position for a while, so you’d have to have some type of income source to pastor at that church.”