NORTH CAROLNA : Investigators Check Another Church Fire

Arson investigators searched the rubble of a 129-year-old church destroyed by fire in rural North Carolina that was attended mainly by whites, officials said. The only thing salvaged from its 129-year-old sanctuary of the Pleasant Ridge United Church of Christ in Guilford County was the cross from the steeple. Fire also destroyed an Englewood, Tenn., church attended mainly by whites, hours after Vice President Al Gore spoke elsewhere in the state about the rash of church blazes. It was unclear what sparked the two fires, officials said. At least 40 fires at churches attended mostly by blacks have been reported over the past 18 months across the Southeast. Authorities have investigated suspicious fires at a similar number of white churches in the same time.