North Carolina church raises funds to erase millions in medical debt

Trinity Moravian Church in Winston-Salem has found rare common ground in a polarized time by directing its charity toward a problem that is immediate, measurable and deeply local: medical debt. The 114-year-old red-brick congregation near the city’s old textile mills, led by the Rev. John Jackman, has used its fundraising to buy past-due medical bills in the surrounding Triad and cancel them outright.

Jackman has described Trinity as a “purple congregation,” with conservatives and liberals worshipping together under the same roof. That political mix has not produced consensus on immigration or student loans, he said, but it has helped the church rally around debt relief for neighbors burdened by hospital bills they cannot pay. “We’ve got quite a spread of political beliefs,” Jackman said.

Working with Undue Medical Debt, Trinity has bought portfolios of overdue accounts for pennies on the dollar and then abolished them as a gift to patients in Forsyth and neighboring counties. One earlier campaign brought in about $15,000 and erased more than $3 million in medical debt for people across the Triad. A later winter drive raised more than $25,000 and wiped out around $2.5 million more, and another campaign identified $2,980,086 in debt across Forsyth, Guilford, Davie, Davidson and Stokes counties.

The church marks each round of forgiveness with a debt-burning ceremony during worship after it receives certification that the debts have been abolished. The ritual turns a financial transaction into a public act of release, with the congregation seeing the debt lists burned only after the medical accounts have been closed.

Trinity’s approach did not stay local. Moravian organizers said the Winston-Salem church helped launch the broader Moravian Church Debt Jubilee Project, which first aimed to raise $50,000 in 50 days. Instead, it raised $102,424.27 and helped erase nearly $11 million in medical debt. A 2024 Moravian Church statement said nearly 1 in 4 families owe medical debt they cannot immediately pay, a figure that helps explain why this kind of relief has resonated well beyond one congregation. In a political climate where broad policy consensus is hard to find, Trinity has shown how a church can turn a shared burden into a shared target, and then make the relief count in dollars, counties and canceled accounts.