Tyler Perry helps end a Chicago pastor's vigil
A pastor in Chicago has ended a long and unusual vigil seeking $450,000 dollars to demolish a building.
CBS News correspondent Michelle Miller reports that, for the first Sunday in three months, Pastor Corey Brooks is back home at the pulpit at New Beginnings Baptist Church on Chicago's Southside.
He's spent the last 94 days across the street, in a tent on the roof of a derelict motel, a place more familiar to drug dealers and prostitutes.
"We're living in the killing field. We're living in a place where you can just be walking to the store, going to get something for your kids and you can be shot and killed," Brooks said.
Brooks believes desperate times call for desperate measure, so he took to the rooftop and vowed not to come down until he'd raised enough money to buy the building, knock it down and build a community center.
"I was a little terrified because I thought then, man this tent is gonna fly off this motel and I'm gonna die in a tent on top of an abandoned motel," Brooks said.
The pastor said he learned a lot up on that roof.
"People have great hearts, and if you can somehow be creative enough to bring it to their attention and their awareness about what's going on that people will rise to the occasion," Brooks said.
Sometimes even famous people will rise to the occasion.
On Friday, day 94, Brooks became the subject of a syndicated radio talk show, "The Tom Joyner Morning Show."
While promoting his new film "Good Deeds," filmmaker Tyler Perry was inspired to perform his own.
"I will give him the $98,000" still needed to complete his campaign, Perry said.
"I said I wasn't going to cry. But 94 days in a tent, I kept crying. I'm so grateful for every gift," Brooks said.
It's just a start. Brooks' next goal is to raise $15 million to build the new community center.
