Sunday Morning Mass 9:00am
Sunday Morning Confessions  8:30am - 8:55am

Weekday Mass
Wednesday 7:30am followed by Adoration and Thursday 7:30 a.m.

 

October 1, 2015

Excerpts from an article by Alfredo E  Cárdenas published in the South Texas Catholic

St. Therese of the Little Flower dedicated on June 26, 1949.

Quoting Pope Francis, Bishop Michael Mulvey told
parishioners of St. Therese of the Little Flower in Woodsboro that “a person of faith is a person who remembers.” The occasion was a Mass “concluding a year of remembering” 100 years of the parish’s existence.

“We stand on the efforts, the faith, the sacrifices of those who have gone before. That is the beauty of church; we stand on those that have gone before us. We stand and remember,” Bishop Mulvey said in his homily.

                                 History

The March 26, 1908 issue of the Southern Messenger reported, “On Sunday, March 8, the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass was offered up for the first time in Woodsboro…at one time called Church…in future Mass will be said in Woodsboro twice a month…” At first services were held at “a private residence.”

In 1914 Father B.J. Donada, with Bishop Paul Nussbaum’s approval, set in motion the building of a new church. Father Stephen Dever of Philadelphia made a sizable donation for construction of the church in memory of his brother Father Bernard Dever. The first church was named St. Bernard in his honor. Bishop Nussbaum dedicated the new sanctuary on Aug. 15, 1915.  In its early years, St. Bernard was a mission or station of Our Lady of Refuge in Refugio. But when the new church was built it was listed as an “independent” church with missions in Tivoli, Austwell and Vidauri (O’Connor Ranch). The bishop named Father Joseph Duenn as the new pastor.

As early as 1929, Father L. W. Guilluame, of French origin, began to call the parish “The Little Flower” in honor of newly canonized French saint, St. Therese of the Little Flower. Father Guilluame reasoned that the parish had improved and enlarged the church at a cost of six times its original cost. The commitment to naming it St. Bernard had been met and exceeded and renaming it was justified since it was in effect a “new church.”

A storm in 1942 damaged the church to the point that it could no longer serve as a sanctuary and Masses were moved to the parish hall. Due to limits on materials placed by the war effort, a new church—which is still in use—was not built and dedicated until July 26, 1949.

For many years, St. Therese did not have a mission church to oversee, but in 1961, St. Mary in Bayside became a mission of St. Therese.

On October 15, 1983, Bishop Rene Gracida ordained Reynaldo Rodriguez, Jr. as a deacon, the first and only vocation to religious life from the parish.

“What has been remembered in this parish for 100 years is the person God sent us, Jesus Christ. Without Jesus Christi we would not be here,”     Bishop Mulvey said.