Rev. Richard Richardson, the former pastor of the St. Paul African Methodist Episcopal Church in Cambridge and a member of the Black Ministerial Alliance of Greater Boston, who with his wife Jestina raised six children and served as foster parents for more than 50 children of color while founding one of Massachusetts’ largest Black-run human service agencies, has passed away at the age of 95 at his home in Lakeland, FL.
The Richardsons founded what would become Children’s Services of Roxbury (CSR) in 1972, after a career that included jobs at Digital Equipment Corporation and General Electric and a call to the ministry that Rev. Richardson said he had to answer. In a 2022 interview commemorating CSR’s 50th anniversary, Rev. Richardson said he never set out to create an organization that would become a beacon of hope and comfort for children and families in crisis, nor did he envision the many ways the organization would impact people’s lives. It started when the couple welcomed foster children into their home.
“We just felt that was the right thing to do to try to help these children, you know, feel like they, like, like they’re being valued and most foster kids will tell you that, you know, they never felt valued,” Rev. Richardson said…