It’s Sunday morning and Fathers Day, and more than 100 people have filled the Cinema Cafe theater inside Greenbrier Mall. Christian music blasts from the speakers as a clock on the movie screen ticks down toward a 10 a.m. start time.

Pastor Bob Groves, right, and his wife Shawn Groves, left, greet congregants as they leave Sunday services at Pastor Bob’s church held at the Cinema Cafe Greenbrier Mall in Chesapeake on Sunday, July 4, 2010.

They’re not here for a movie. They are here to listen to the Rev. Bob Groves.

It has been a year since Groves, the pastor of Faith Alive Ministries, got up in front of 1,500 of his congregants and apologized for having an affair with a married church staffer.

Groves says he was forced to leave Faith Alive. The church’s new pastor said Groves left on his own after failing to complete a clergy restoration program.

Less than four months ago, Groves and his wife started a new church, Genesis Ministry, in a rented theater at Cinema Cafe.

Meanwhile, Faith Alive needs a new home.

The church’s $11 million, 46,000-square-foot building in Deep Creek was hit by foreclosure and sold at auction late last month for $7.1 million to another local church, Faith Alive officials said. Faith Alive owed a bank more than $8 million it borrowed to build the sanctuary.

“There was just no way we could pay back all the money that was spent,” said Jim Chambers, the church’s new lead pastor. “The bottom line is, this congregation, given all that it’ s been through, couldn’t afford the building.”

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Source: Hampton Roads Pilot Online | Mike Saewitz
The Virginian-Pilot