St. Anthony's renovates church for 75th anniversary

“This church belongs to the people and they are very proud of it,” said Father Jamie Medina Cruz, pastor of St. Anthony of Padua Church in Natchitoches, which will be celebrating its 75th anniversary May 27-29.  It was established in 1935 as the first Catholic Church in Natchitoches for “colored” people.

    In preparation for the 75th anniversary of St. Anthony Church, the parishioners have been busy working on improvements to the church.

    Renovations to the Church began four years ago, when Father Cruz, was first assigned to the parish. He noticed that the Sanctuary (altar area) was in bad need of repair.

    “I told the congregation, ‘one day, that paneling above the altar is going to fall down on me during Mass,’” he said.  The congregation immediately got to work and over the next four years made renovations to the church that improved the lighting, the physical appearance and the aesthetics of the interior.

    Some of the immediate improvements included:

• replacing the dark wood paneling on the walls with a lighter concrete sheetrock
• adding new light fixtures to increase the light in the church
• new doors
• new microphone system
• new porcelain floors around the altar
• new Italian tile flooring in the outer sanctuary area.
• a new communion rail, lectern, and ambo

    The total cost of renovations to the altar area alone was at least $50,000.

    In 2008, a new church hall was built.  The facility includes a large meeting/conference social hall with a large commercial kitchen, several meeting rooms/classrooms for religious education, a chapel, and office space.

    More recently, the church began making improvements to the spiritual environment.  Some of those improvements are:

• new gold-plated altar candles
• new gold-plated processional altar cross and sanctuary light
• a new $5,000 tabernacle donated by an anonymous donor from Many
• new marble pedestal donated by an anonymous donor
• 6 stained-glass windows donated by parishioners; 4 more in the making
• 2 large icon paintings of St. Peter & St. Paul by Michael Yankowski
• 4 large icon paintings of the 4 Gospel writers (Matthew, Mark, Luke & John) by Michael Yankowski
• restoration of the stations of the cross by Michael Yankowski

    On March 27, Michael Yankowski returned to St. Anthony’s one more time to present and hang in the foyer of the church, a large traditional painting of Our Lady of Perpetual Help. 

    “The renovated St. Anthony of Padua Church is a beautiful, new, vibrant place of worship for everyone, but especially for the parishioners who have generously supported this project for the last four years,” said Father Jamie.

    The Msgr. Piegay School will also hold a class reunion during the May 27-29 celebration. More than 240 former students from across the U.S. will be returning for the reunion.

  Out of his loving concern for the spiritual and educational needs of the French Creoles of Natchitoches, Bishop Desmond of the diocese of Alexandria asked the Holy Ghost Fathers to establish a new parish in the historic city.  Msgr. Anthony Piegay, pastor of Immaculate Conception Church in Natchitoches, bought land on the northeast corner of Pavie and Fifth Street and supervised the building of St. Anthony Church in 1935; the land was purchased from Judge D.C. Scarborough.

    Fr. Joseph Kelly was appointed to care for the new parish in 1935.  In 1936, Fr. Ivan Huber was appointed the first pastor of St. Anthony Church; his first task was to build a rectory behind the new church.

    Land was purchased in 1938 to build a two-story school which would eventually be named "The Piegay Memorial School."

    The parish grew rapidly and property was acquired to build a new church and rectory.  Groundbreaking took place on May 26, 1963 and Bishop Charles P. Greco blessed the new church and rectory on January 26, 1964.

-From the Diocesan Archives

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