Don't Feed the Preacher

White insisted to his congregation that he was taking the fall for others. Hardy handled the ministry while White served his sentence, and he rejoined the church after his release on June 24, 2002. The church continued to meet for a few months before it dissolved, Hardy says.

Sitting on his porch as the sky grows dark, Hardy says he's had a let-bygones-be-bygones meeting with White since the debacle on Bennington. Hardy says he told White that he accepted him as a brother in Christ but that they couldn't be friends.

A smile periodically crosses Hardy's face as he discusses White's activities. A part of him seems to hold in awe White's audacity and ability to get others to do his bidding.

"If you didn't know him, I guarantee he would have you eating out of his hand."

White lives in a house off Swope Parkway, not far from where the children collect donations. He answers the door wearing a red T-shirt and blue gym shorts.

Moving gingerly, he takes a seat on a chair in a sparsely decorated living room. Several bottles of prescription pills and a box for a T-Mobile phone lie at his feet. He has a wide face, and he speaks in a voice that sounds coarsened from illness or overuse.

"I'm just tired," he says. "I don't know what's going on. Everybody's coming at me in so many directions. I've been sick."

White says he was recently discharged from the hospital. He says he suffers from a host of health problems: high blood pressure, diabetes, bad heart, bad knees. "I'm a cancer survivor," he says. "I'm a stroke survivor. I've had two heart attacks. Do you see all that medication on the floor? God keeps me alive."

White grew up in Kansas City. He says he started preaching when he was 17 or 18. In doing so, he followed his father into the pulpit. His father, W.H. White, is the pastor at Immanuel Baptist Church at Ninth Street and Olive.

Carva White says he didn't want to become a minister, but God called him. His first church met at a house at 40th Street and Mersington. He says he's used the name New Higher Ground for as long as he's been spreading the Word.

White does not profess to be faultless. He admits to making mischief when he was younger, to being a "wild child." He brings up the bank-fraud conviction without being asked; he claims to have been an innocent bystander. "My cousin gave me a check. I put the check in the bank. I didn't know the check was no good."

As he talks, the room beings to fill with people, including his two sons, Conta, 17, and Christopher, 15. (The boys' mother lives in Topeka.) White says there will be a Bible study at the house tonight.

White's family situation is fluid. He married a woman shortly after his release from prison; the relationship, White says, is headed for divorce. He says he has eight children (and five more White says he adopted unofficially), but he claimed only four dependents in an affidavit filed with the federal court in February.

White says the financial problems came as a result of his incarceration, although a few of his civil court cases predate the indictment. "When I got out, I was sleeping on the bench of my church. I was sleeping on the bench. Am I kidding, y'all?" His voice cracks. Moments later, a young woman gives him a paper towel so he can blow his nose.

White describes the street fund-raising as "candy sales." He claims that the most the children have raised in one day is $150. He says he understands the safety concerns. "But I always have an adult with all the children. Always." He says it was his son Conta who came up with the idea to sell the candy to strangers. "I told them, 'If you all think you can do it and you all want to help the church, that's fine with me,'" White says.

At the moment, White is using someone else's church. The remnants of New Higher Ground merged with another church three months ago. On Sundays, White sings, plays organ and preaches at Holy Temple of Jesus at 34th Street and Troost. The founder of Holy Temple, Agnes Ferdinand, is 65 and frail from the effects of a stroke she suffered a couple of years ago. Ferdinand says she has known White since he was a boy. She calls his arrival a blessing. "One day, he just walked in and started helping, and I appreciate it," she says.

White is leading an effort to remake Holy Temple into something much grander than it is today. He says the money the children have raised has paid for remodeling. "It's painted," he says. "It looks presentable. It's clean. We cleaned up all that. We're going to be feeding the homeless."

White has tried to care for the homeless in the past. The effort made headlines in Springfield.

Before 6 a.m. on December 17, 2004, Nick Heatherly, the director of building development services in Springfield, approached a white clapboard church with a team of police and fire inspectors. Heatherly had a warrant to search the new home of New Higher Ground Ministries.