Maybe it's the gorgeous old architecture. Or the warm Birkenstocks-wearing priest. In any case, St. Mary Our Lady of Grace is feeling as invigorated as the area it serves.
By WAVENEY ANN MOORE
Published April 24, 2004
ST. PETERSBURG - It seems appropriate that columns standing sentinel at one of the city's main entrances should be positioned across from St. Mary Our Lady of Grace Catholic Church.
The distinctive red brick church at Fourth Street and Fifth Avenue S has an important place in the city's history. Sitting on property once owned by Gen. John C. Williams, the St. Petersburg pioneer after whom Williams Park is named, St. Mary's was the city's first Catholic parish and helped launch two others - St. Joseph's and St. Paul's.
In recent years, though, St. Mary's congregation began to age, and young families were a rarity, except for downtown workers who took advantage of the church's convenient location to attend weekday noontime Masses.
Change, however, is arriving at the majestic church:
- St. Mary's welcomed almost a dozen new Catholics into its fold during the Easter Vigil Mass recently. The ceremony, known as the Rite of Christian Initiation for Adults, had not been held at the church in many years.
- Last spring, St. Mary's entered the cyber age. It now has a presence on the Internet.
- During the past year, the congregation grew from 578 to about 740 households, and the number of infant baptisms rose.
- More and more couples are choosing the church for their weddings.
If the congregation has its way, that's only the beginning.
St. Mary's, said Father Luke Robertson, a Franciscan friar who arrived a little more than a year ago, is creating a new vision.
"Over the next year, we are going to be doing certain things to find out how we are going to respond to the changes in downtown St. Petersburg, the University of South Florida campus and downtown residents. How can we at St. Mary's best serve them?" he said.
"And I think we have a lot to offer them. We are very blessed to have a beautiful church. We have a wonderful location and warm and friendly people. ... One of the things that we have noticed is that we have an increasingly large number of younger people and younger families joining us. They are coming from all over the place and they are bringing some wonderful things with them."
Jennifer Lehman, 29, is part of the younger crowd.
"My fiance and I just joined the parish maybe six months ago," the software implementation consultant said.
"We visited a couple of different churches and St. Mary's just kind of felt like the right fit for us, the atmosphere of the church, the message we were getting. We really liked Father Luke and his presentation. Also, we're getting married soon and St. Mary's is a beautiful church," said Ms. Lehman, who was among those entering the Catholic Church this Easter through the RCIA program.
Christian Fisher, 35, the church's director of music and liturgy, is in charge of the nine-month-long initiation program, which focuses on church history, teachings and practices. He said it was the first formal one that St. Mary's had offered for those interested in joining the Catholic Church.
"When I came here, we basically advertised it to the church community during Sunday Mass and we put it in the church bulletin, and so from that we got the 11 people," he said.
Jason Land, 27, who was brought up a Baptist, was a member of Fisher's class. He and his wife, Patricia, a Eucharistic minister, started attending St. Mary's in June and remained because they immediately felt welcome, Land said.
The red brick church now attracting a younger generation is the third building St. Mary's has occupied since becoming a parish 84 years ago. According to its Web site, St. Mary's first Mass was celebrated in 1908 at a small chapel at Sixth Street and Fifth Avenue S. By 1910, the congregation had outgrown the tiny chapel and plans were made to build a new church at Fourth Street and Third Avenue S. The first Mass there was said in 1913. The current St. Mary's was built in 1929. Described as Byzantine in style with Romanesque features, it features Italian and German stained glass windows, marble floors, grand archways, seven balconies and a gold domed canopy with angels over its altar.
(A margin note: The restroom at the beginning of the Pier approach - the 1927 Comfort Station - indeed bears a striking resemblance to St. Mary's and was designed by the same architect, Henry Taylor. But despite what trolly tour guides say, he most likely used the same style simply because he liked Romanesque Revival, not as revenge for not being paid. In fact, the church was built after the Comfort Station. His widow later said he had been paid in full.)
The church, which has a strong social service tradition, continues to serve the poor and elderly through an outreach program led by Sister Alice Belanger of the Religious of the Cenacle. It was at St. Mary's that Daystar Life Center, a downtown charity that assists the poor, got its start. Father Luke sits on its board. The priest is convinced that St. Mary's has a place downtown.
"I've worked in a variety of parishes and I'd like to think that gives me a certain perspective," he said, adding that the church fits the "downtown model."
That means, he said, it provides opportunities for people - many of whom are not parishioners - to worship and receive the sacraments.
"We draw a lot of people from the hospitals. It's a great thing to be able to provide worship opportunities to them and them being able to just walk over to the church. That has been a very strong thing for St. Mary's for many years," the priest said.
St. Mary's, he added, serves four distinct populations, year-round members, snowbirds, visitors and those who attend regularly but aren't members. The church also offers a popular French Mass on Saturday afternoons from November to April.
Father Luke, who is 46, is part of the Franciscan community that serves the church. A Franciscan for almost 12 years and a priest for five, he prefers to be known as a friar first and a priest second. It's the custom in his religious community, he said.
He last served at St. Andrew's in Fort Worth, Texas, and follows in the footsteps of the Rev. Bernardine Smith, St. Mary's beloved priest who died in 2002, at age 71.
Fisher, 35, the church's director of music and liturgy, arrived in October from Toledo, Ohio. St. Mary's, he said, is making a concerted effort to build a diverse parish.
"Our approach is to attract more varieties of ages and to offer some sense of spirituality to a wide variety of ages," said Fisher, who in addition to leading the RCIA class recently completed an infant baptism class with 14 couples.
Father Luke is pleased with St. Mary's growth.
"Our choir has doubled in size since October. There have been more baptisms. We have probably tripled the number of liturgical ministers," he said, referring to members of the congregation who volunteer as readers, servers, Eucharistic ministers and hospitality ministers.
Newcomers include Katharine Gallant and her son, Paul, 15.
"We tried all the churches," said Ms. Gallant, who recently moved with Paul from Massachusetts.
"I like the reverence that is there and every week you see more and more young families. We came to really love it. The older men, they just love Paul. It's been a very welcoming place for us."
Paul, who had been scheduled to be confirmed before their relocation, joined the RCIA class and was to receive the sacrament recently.
Lisa Zupko discovered St. Mary's more than a year ago.
"I go downtown a lot," said Ms. Zupko, 30, who works in the public relations department at the Home Shopping Network and lives in Historic Kenwood.
"I like to ride my bike and when I saw the church, I just thought it was beautiful, the gold doors, and I heard the bells and saw the people walking to church. It just fits the downtown feel. That's why I went the first time, because of the location. The church is just gorgeous, inside and out."
But Ms. Zupko, who was to become a new Catholic recently, remembers how welcome Father Luke made her feel last Easter, when he went to the balcony to serve communion to those sitting there. He wore Birkenstocks, she remembered.
"That was just cool. I walked to him with my hands crossed (the protocol for non-Catholics) and he just made me feel so welcome and he blessed me and I just knew that this was going to be my church home," she said.
"I've been going to the Catholic church for three or four years now, but it's really St. Mary's Our Lady of Grace that made me want to take the next step."
