Craven County sisters lift their voices to heal the 'hurting needs'

Growing up in a household in rural Craven County with 11 other siblings, Teresia Jones was a witness to her family's daily financial struggles.

It was the same struggle, years later, she would see stamped like a tattoo on the faces in prisons and boys homes where she sang the gospel with her sisters.

Calling themselves the Dunn Sisters, Jones and seven of her kin began performing in the mid-1980s at the urging of their mother. Jones was 18 and already living on her own when she heard a knock on her apartment door.

“My oldest sister and my mother came and said they wanted to do something in the way of putting a group together,” she recalled. “Before that we were just messing around and were singing in the church every now and then.”

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The sisters soon branched out to bring their songs to local prisons, convalescent homes and boys homes. Jones said their choice of venues was a deliberate attempt to reach those who had dealt with the same hardships they had faced.

“We actually went to places we thought would need a lot of assistance in their hurts and their needs. Being a family of 12 that didn’t have too much money we were able to relate to some of those hurts,” Jones said.

Jones described the Dunn Sisters’ music as mainly contemporary gospel, with praise and worship mixed in.

“Every now and then we might throw in a traditional song but that’s not really our style,” she commented. “Our main thrust is to sing songs that speak of God and the Lord.”

In 2000, the Dunn Sisters recorded a CD, “Experience the Vision.”

“We want to get back into that and do another one, start working on it this year,” said Jones.

“We were a little ahead of our time I must say, because what we recorded back then sounds like the songs they’re doing now.”

In addition to Jones, the Dunn Sisters are: Irene Kinsey, Lorene Daniels, Glenda Dunn, Roxene Barrett, Angelia Nobles, Chantel Dunn, and the youngest sister, Stephanie Dunn-Pate.

The sisters are often backed up by family members as well, with Jones’ husband on lead guitar, her son on drums and her nephew on the keyboard.

According to Dunn-Pate, the act of singing and performing together has brought the sister’s closer over the years.

“It’s the joy of knowing that we have that connection and when we are singing or ministering to people we really just know how to network together,” she said.

That connection has remained so strong, in fact, that all 12 Dunn family siblings still live near one another in eastern North Carolina, a fact that would have pleased their mother.

“The group has actually been our life, when we start talking about it and look back at it,” Jones admitted. “Because there’s 12 of us and why are we all still in the area? We start laughing and say ‘Oh, those prayers of our mother really worked.’ I was planning on going to Florida or upstate and Stephanie was planning on going in the Air Force. Different ones moved away and came back.”

A new beginning with MERCI Clinic benefit concert

Now celebrating 36 years together, the Dunn Sisters next performance will serve both as a benefit concert for New Bern’s free healthcare facility, MERCI Clinic, and as the relaunch for their sisters’ newest project, Secret Place Ministry Center.

The MERCI Clinic benefit concert will be held this Saturday, March 12 at the ministry, located at 700 Professional Dr. in New Bern, with the Dunn Sisters as the featured performers.

Soloist Minister Natalie Daniels will also perform at the benefit and a praise and worship service will be led by Pastor Bradley Cannon.

Doors will open at 4 p.m. with the concert beginning at 5 p.m. Participants are encouraged to bring office supplies to donate to MERCI Clinic or leave a Staples gift card.

More: Free concert to feature local 'singing ministry' sisters

Located at 1315 Tatum Dr. in New Bern, MERCI Clinic has served low income, uninsured residents of Craven, Jones, and Pamlico counties since 1966. MERCI Clinic normally sees between 500 and 600 patients a year.

Jones said the benefit concert will also serve as a way to let community members know that Secret Place Ministry Center is ready to open its doors for services again. The family-run ministry, which opened in 2020, was forced to close its doors shortly afterward due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Jones’ sister, Irene, serves as pastor, while Dunn-Pate is the ministry’s public relations and marketing director.

According to Jones, the ministry was inspired by her mother, Christine Dunn, who died four years ago. One of the ministry’s first members was Jones’ brother, who passed away in Oct. 2021.

“My mother was a praying woman. When she passed away we really thought it was a necessity to really delve into it a little bit more and the ministry was started through my sister, Irene,” Jones said. “She started looking for a building to start prayer in, to minister to my brother first.”

While Jones admitted that getting Secret Place Ministry Center up and running has been a struggle, she said overcoming life’s hardships is what gives her family’s music its singular power. She said the group is planning other projects in the near future to help, as she describes it, “supply the hurting needs of people.”

“Anytime you’re doing something like this you’re going to have opposition and trust me, we’ve had our share,” Jones said. “But all of that is so you’ll be able to relate to the people you’re ministering to, if you’ve gone through certain things yourself. There’s nothing like knowing exactly how somebody is feeling.”

For more information about the MERCI Clinic benefit concert or Secret Place Ministry Center, contact Teresia Jones at 295-9893.

This article originally appeared on Sun Journal: Craven County sisters lift their voices to heal those facing hardships