Our next stop along our Road of Faith travels brings us to Bay St. Louis, Mississippi. By St. Louis is what hurricane Katrina made landfall in 2005. New Orleans got the publicity but Bay St. Louis took the brunt of the storm.
This Church has almost as much history as it does vibrant life.
The history of St. Rose de Lima Church and school are interrelated and it goes back nearly 100 years. In 1868, the first school in Bay St. Louis for African Americans opened with twenty-four black children in attendance! It was a two-story white building, originally located on Second Street. On August 28, 1925, the school became St. Rose de Lima Church.
St. Rose de Lima is still an extremely active church and parish. Home to one of the best Southern Gospel Choirs in the country, its altar features an extraordinary mural of an African Christ figure rising before a live oak tree.
We attended Easter morning Mass at St. Rose de Lima Catholic Church. Talk about waking up in the Spirit with the joy of the resurrection our Lord Jesus Christ. Wow! I don’t think Connie and I have ever been to a southern Gospel church before. My Emmaus brothers and sister will get it – this Mass was Emmaus joy. Imagine the joy bursting forth from your soul every celebration of Holy Mass. So many Christians and Catholics walk through life with downtrodden spirits and faces lines from years of frowns. But, the joy erupting in the congregation and music at St Rose de Lima is where we should always find our souls, especially at Mass, but also in life.
Feel a renewal of your soul – next time in southern Mississippi, make it a point to join the celebration at St. Rose de Lima Catholic Church.
Listen and see the joy of this all male choir as the church praises the joy of this happy day.
The altar, ambo, tabernacle, and table are all carved from local wood retrieved from the Bay. Master woodworker Ellsworth Collins, who passed away in 1996 after spending his life in Bay St. Louis, crafted the altar from an extraordinary rooted stump found near St. Stanislaus College. The wooden altar base appears to be reaching toward heaven.
“Christ in the Oaks,” was painted by Armenian artist Auseklis Ozols, founder of the New Orleans Academy of Fine Art. As recorded in Mississippi Back Roads:Notes on Literature and History(Elmo Howell), Ozols envisioned a mural that would represent both the Crucifixion and the Resurrection:
“The figure of Christ hangs in the air, behind him the tree, the Cross, the symbol of the earth mightily grasping the ground. But Christ has broken free! The tree is behind him, yet it is his burden also.”
