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Bullhead City parish breaks ground on new church
By J.D. Long-García, The Catholic Sun
March 6, 2008
BULLHEAD CITY — Twenty minutes before every single Mass, St. Margaret Mary parishioners pray the rosary for the Blessed Mother’s intercession.
While the community broke ground on a new church Feb. 27, Bishop Thomas J. Olmsted emphasized that the parishioners and their prayer lives are more important than the building itself.
“The breaking of the ground — the beginning of a new church — is very important. What is more important is to break the bad habits so that what grows, what builds is the people of God,” the bishop said in his homily. He concelebrated a Mass with the parish pastor, Fr. Peter Dobrowski, before the groundbreaking ceremony.
The bishop noted that church buildings, through their beauty and architecture, could bring Catholics closer to God. But acts of love are always more important, he said.
“We are building on solid spiritual foundations that have been nourished in this community for years,” the bishop said. “This building will represent and be an example to others of the faith, hope and love that makes for the community of St. Margaret Mary Parish.”
More than 300 Catholics from the burgeoning parish joined the bishop and Fr. Dobrowski at the Mass and groundbreaking.
While the current church seats 300, the new church will accommodate more than 1,000. The parish has grown from 600 to 1,300 registered parishioners since he became pastor in 1991.
“We’re building for the future,” said Kevin Hassett, past parish council president. Hassett started the second collection to raise funds when the building project first started.
The parish, which was founded in 1947, has been working on building the new church for 16 years. A study commissioned in the 1990s recommended a new building by 2000, but skyrocketing construction costs doubled the price tag, Hassett said.
Of the $6 million required, the parish has raised $3.4 million — enough to start building the shell of the church. The second phase of fundraising began this year. No date has been set for when construction will be completed.
“We’ve always wanted it to look Catholic, inside and out,” said Trish Hecht of the parish council. “We’ve always had that in mind when it was architecturally drawn out.”
“It’s modeled after the mission churches in Mexico,” Fr. Dobrowski said of the new building, designed by Duncan Stroik of the University of Notre Dame in Indiana.
Fr. Dobrowski estimated that 40 percent of the parish is Hispanic. Most parishioners are retired.
“The biggest surprise is that the parish has stayed pretty steady,” the pastor said. Fr. Dobrowski celebrates five Masses every weekend, and each one is full.
St. Margaret Mary has adoration every first Friday and tries to make every event bilingual. On Fridays during Lent, the Stations of the Cross take place simultaneously in English and Spanish inside and outside the church. The two groups meet for Benediction and adoration after the Stations.
The community, which prays the Our Father in Latin during their Masses, is close-knit.
“We’re all very thankful for Fr. Peter,” said Joanne Otlo, parishioner for the last 20 years. “He knows every one of us. He is one of our family. You can go to him for everything.”
Reyes Ruiz, the parish religious education coordinator and youth minister, meets with every new parishioner. He said it was vital to have the meetings, especially with the immigrant parishioners.
“They’re not written-letter people. They’re spoken-word people,” Ruiz explained. “Hispanics think it’s cold to just fill out a form and leave.”
Ruiz also heads up the Mystics of the Sacred Heart, the youth group at St. Margaret Mary. St. Margaret Mary Alacoque fostered the devotion to the Sacred Heart in the 17th century.
In addition to praying the Sacred Heart prayer, the teens also meet for adoration and pray the Divine Mercy chaplet as well as carry out corporal works of mercy like visiting the sick in their homes and bringing dinner to shut-ins.
“It isn’t just about them learning,” Ruiz said of the youth group. “It’s about them doing service for the Church. There’s life after catechism classes.”
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