The Official Newspaper of the Diocese of Little Rock
Click on a headline below to read stories from Arkansas Catholic's special series celebrating the faith in rural Arkansas.
SHERIDAN -- Holy Cross Church was the first Catholic church in Grant County and is now ready to expand for a third time since its dedication Feb. 20, 1949.
When Frank Skorcz and his family came to Sheridan in 1915 via covered wagon from Illinois, they were the first Catholics in the county.
The nearest church was in Pine Bluff, which was a two-day journey. A priest from Pine Bluff would come several times a year More... 
OSCEOLA -- The original wooden church no longer stands in Osceola, but the memory of its pioneer spirit still burns bright in the hearts of parishioners.
“It’s a wonderful little church, and we really take care of ourselves. If you’ve been brought up a Catholic, it’s home. Everybody would be devastated if we lost this church,” said Patty Butler who moved to Osceola in 1946 from Blytheville. “I don’t think it’s that way for everyone, but More...
NEWPORT -- Without the tender, loving care of her parishioners, St. Cecilia Church in Newport would be an empty shell.
Instead, the dedicated parishioners at the small parish keep the church alive and running smoothly for Father Phillip Reaves, who is also pastor at St. Mary Church in Batesville.
"We feel blessed to have a priest, with the priest shortage, and we're such a small parish," said Sharon Robinson, who serves on the parish council More...
PINE BLUFF -- At the end of St. Raphael Road in Pine Bluff sits a small church with a stone crucifix standing witness to the history of St. Raphael Mission.
Since 1932, the mission has remained an anchor for the church community.
It's a community that still survives with the descendants of the original founding families.
Families like the Martins, Gales, Gables, Pierres, Dixons, Nichols and Beardens. The Bunting family later became part of the mission community, More...
CRAWFORDSVILLE -- Change is in the wind at Sacred Heart of Jesus Church in Crawfordsville.
In some ways, the updates are new but also sort of a return to what the church looked like when it was dedicated in 1949, replacing a wooden structure that burned.
Parishioners have been pitching in to do the work and hope to complete the renovation in time to celebrate Easter, said parishioner Carol Smith.
The parish has long been paired with More...
BALD KNOB -- Parishioners think of St. Richard Church in Bald Knob as one big family, which comes together once a week to celebrate. They know one another well because they are long-time members of the parish.
On Saturday, Feb. 6, there were almost 40 people at Mass. Before Mass, they prayed the rosary. After the rosary, they discussed whether to continue praying the rosary during Lent or the Stations of the Cross and decided More...
McGEHEE -- Although small in numbers, there is activity almost every day at St. Mary Church in McGehee.
On a cold Saturday, Jan. 9, when the temperature did not get above freezing, 30 people showed up for the vigil Mass. As always, some arrived 30 minutes before Mass to recite the rosary for their intentions and for Catholics who have strayed from the Church.
The church's administrator, Father Chuma P. Ibebuike, who lives in Crossett, was More...
DUMAS -- Holy Child of Jesus Church in Dumas is a long way for two men who met at a pilgrimage in Mexico, to see one another again, but meet they did.
Father Phillip Reaves, who comes from St. Mark Church in Monticello to celebrate a bilingual Mass on Sunday afternoons, recalls going on the pilgrimage in Mexico more than five years ago, where, as he said, because he was the only person not from Mexico, More...
BRINKLEY -- A friendly face is never far away for those attending St. John the Baptist Church in Brinkley.
"It's very homey," Amanda Albersan of Brinkley said. "They are all friendly."
Albersan -- alongside her sister Mary Lange, and their families -- has attended Mass at the church for around a year. The sisters moved to the town after Lange's husband received a teaching position at a local school district.
The sisters said they have More...
MARIANNA -- Something was off.
All was going well during Mass in the small parish of St. Andrew Church in Marianna, but the pastor couldn't figure out what felt different. It took a moment before the former parish priest grasped the problem: No one sat where they usually did.
Margie Sallis smiled as she explained the parish pulled the prank at the pastor's last Mass at the church.
"He just laughed and said, 'Ya'll trying to More...
HORSESHOE LAKE -- Carl Chambers jokes he is the oldest altar boy in the Catholic Church.
Chambers, who will turn 90 in December, said he has helped the past 10 to 12 pastors to serve at St. Mary of the Lake Church in Horseshoe Lake (Crittenden County).
Greeting everyone by name, Chambers is one of the first smiling faces people see as they enter the church built by hand in 1964.
The church was designed and built in More...
MARKED TREE -- St. Norbert Church has always been a mission of a larger parish. It has never had many members, and its resources have always been limited. So when the original church, built in 1949, had to be torn down in 1981, Randy Shinabery feared it would not be replaced.
"'There's just no way we'll ever build this church,'" he remembered telling his mother Marie. And she in turn advised her son to have a More...
McCRORY -- B.J. Breckenridge, 81, like many of his fellow parishioners, has been a lifelong member of St. Mary Church. His grandparents, Ben and Mary Starman, moved to the McCrory area in 1914.
Though another family made the journey with them, they returned to Illinois shortly thereafter, making the Starmans the only known Catholics in Woodruff County.
"My grandpa and grandma used to go down here at Patterson and catch a train and go to More...
ENGLAND -- Before a mission was established in England in 1976, Catholic families in the area went to Carlisle, Slovak, Pine Bluff or Little Rock to attend Mass.
Parishioner Donna Busick, 63, recalled how the late Joe Dolan would take his children, along with several others, to Mass at the Cathedral of St. Andrew every Sunday. England, located in Lonoke County, is about 30 miles from downtown Little Rock.
"He was kind of our More...
FORDYCE -- Jeanne Devlin gets the coffee started each Saturday around 3 p.m. when she arrives at Good Shepherd in Fordyce for the weekly Mass at 4 p.m.
"I didn't know there were any Catholics around when we moved here in 1971," she said. "Jan Hutchins, now deceased, started calling people in 1976, asking if they were Catholic and whether they wanted to start meeting for Mass."
For the next four years, about 15 people gathered in More...
GRADY -- Dorothy Russell, 78, is a life-long resident of Grady and a fount of information about Blessed Sacrament Church.
"Grady started out as a Catholic community," she explained. "My grandfather was among the first parishioners. And according to my research, the first family to live in Grady was the John S. Hall family and they were Catholics."
The tiny church is located on Highway 11 in the middle of a cemetery, just west of town. More...
FOREMAN -- Sacred Heart Church in Foreman has a storied past, steeped in church and secular history. Most of the 30 or so people who attend 9 a.m. Sunday Mass in the brick-and-frame building on Bell Street know the history, which dates to the dawn of the Diocese of Little Rock.
But new parishioners are arriving. Three Hispanic families joined recently and more people are expected, due in large part to a multimillion-dollar expansion of More...
CORNING -- The Catholic church in Corning has a certain glow.
Sunlight filtering through one or more of four cruciform stained-glass windows, depending on the time of day, captures part of the intensity.
But the sensation runs deeper than the physical design of St. Joseph the Worker Church, impressive as the towering A-frame with its gleaming cypress and walnut may be.
"We're the only Catholic presence in Clay County," said Fran Black, the church sacristan, bookkeeper and More...
HARTFORD -- Mary Radley and family have a second home in Hartford. They share it with at least 22 other households in Sebastian County, some hailing from nearby Huntington, Hackett, Mansfield and Greenwood. More are welcome, especially children.
There's a tradition to uphold -- one defined by devotion, donations and labor.
St. Leo the Great Church stands as testimony to this active stewardship. It's been this way for more than 100 years, since the Central Coal More...
This is the first in a series of articles profiling some of the smallest Catholic missions in the Diocese of Little Rock. Each month another church will be highlighted.
ASHDOWN -- The roughly 30 active members of St. Elizabeth Ann Seton understandably have mixed emotions about the pending appointment of a new bishop for the Church in Arkansas.
They realize attendance at Sunday Mass has dwindled by more than half in the 17 years since More...
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