A NOSTALGIC BLAST FROM THE PAST

 

I was assigned to the Church of the Most Holy Trinity in Augusta on June 2, 1991. This was the pre-restoration look of both the church building and me. Please note that I have lots of hair, which is dark brown and naturally so, and that I wear a chasuble which is designed for the stole to be overlaid upon it on the outside. That was very 1970’s and 80’s, if I do say so myself. And it was so me!

This photo is probably 1993 or so. It is the 10 AM Mass there. The Church seats about 900 comfortably. Our 10 AM Mass regularly had standing room only and maybe 100 or so standing at the back and remaining for the entire Mass! 

That is not the case today. By that point, we had increased membership from about 600 households to 1,400. Today, I think they are back to around 600 or so. 

Just to qualify that growth, Most Holy Trinity in those days benefited from the woes of the other parishes in town and people knew they had a refuge for good liturgy there (established well before I got there, btw, but I put on steroids). 

Augusta was in the process of shifting its population westward and well into the next county, which at that time belonged to the Archdiocese of Atlanta. The western parish was on the county line and had a pastor, God rest his soul, who was a bit polarizing, thus we benefited. In the last year or so my my time there, early 2000’s, the next county was annexed by the Diocese of Savannah, the border church in the west was closed and moved deeper into the next county and it grew from about 500 families then to about 2,200 families now and their new church is exceptionally traditional and beautiful, although I’m not sure about their liturgies. Augusta is booming in its western suburbs. Change in pastors accounts for much of the growth in that parish as well as the new church in the new location. But that affected the Church of the Most Holy Trinity which has maybe 200 families today who actually live in the parish boundaries.

Downtown Augusta is contiguous with North Augusta across the Savannah River which is in South Carolina and a part of the Diocese of Charleston. That community is booming too and Most Holy Trinity still has many members who live in South Carolina. If not for crossovers from other dioceses and parishes, Most Holy Trinity could not survive with its downtown parishioners alone.