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<p>It was around 2 p.m., Aug. 29, 2022, when a lightning bolt struck the 150-year-old Mary, Queen of Angels Church in Fort Scott, Kansas. At the adjacent St. Mary’s Catholic School, the bolt’s sheer force knocked several students out of their seats and shook the ceiling tiles. </p>
<p>When Father Yancey Burgess, the parish’s pastor, assessed the damage, he discovered that the lightning “completely fried” the church’s elevator lift, but “didn’t see anything further wrong with the school and the church.” Despite the day’s oddity, life went on normally. A men’s group held a meeting at 6 p.m. in the church, while others were in the school in the day’s waning hours. </p>
<p>However, by 8 p.m., the fire that ignited in the attic finally revealed itself, as smoke arose from the church’s roof. The inferno rapidly consumed the structure — the church could not be saved (though the Blessed Sacrament was brought to safety). </p>
<p>Throughout the night, hundreds of faithful stood by, watching their beloved spiritual home engulfed by the flames, nearly reduced to rubble. All the interior artwork was now ash or damaged seemingly beyond repair. The roof had caved in, with burnt timbers cluttering the nave, which were still hot when morning arrived. </p>
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<figure><img src="https://publisher-ncreg.s3.us-east-2.amazonaws.com/pb-ncregister/swp/hv9hms/media/2025013114010_b491c88ed030199c89651d83052f750fff0216041c584bbd71857fa7308d76c5.jpg" data-media-id="editor_0" data-image-id="2025013114010_b491c88ed030199c89651d83052f750fff0216041c584bbd71857fa7308d76c5" data-rendition-name="original" width="3000" height="4000" loading="lazy" alt="The roof of the parish completely collapsed. "/><figcaption>The roof of the parish completely collapsed.<span>(Photo: Courtesy photo)</span></figcaption></figure>
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<p>Still, Father Burgess did not despair. He knew the parish would be rebuilt — but it would take more than two years. </p>
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<h3><b>‘Deserving Our Best’</b></h3>
<p>When Robert Elliot first heard about the fire, he immediately called Father Burgess and offered his talents. Before his retirement this past December, Elliot had his own <a href="https://robertelliotstudio.wixsite.com/resstudios">art studio</a> for nearly 30 years in Wichita. </p>
<p>Although not a parishioner of Mary, Queen of Angels, the fire struck him deeply. Father Burgess and Elliot developed a friendship years prior when the latter’s wife, Theresa, became ill and passed away in 2016. The former was the hospital chaplain at The Chapel of the Sorrowful Mother, Via Christi, St. Francis Campus; he would later be the main celebrant at Theresa’s funeral Mass. </p>
<p>“This church was a treasure, not just for the people of Mary, Queen of Angels, but a treasure of the [Diocese of Wichita] too,” Elliot told the Register. </p>
<p>But the task would be monumental and time-consuming. The Stations of the Cross, which are nearly 5 feet tall, were “absolutely destroyed,” merely “piles of debris,” the artist said. Apart from the “trauma” inflicted by the fire, several pieces were as old as the church itself and thus fragile and delicate when touched. Moreover, funding would be limited, as the insurance only covered $59,000 to replace the items — the project would eventually cost $160,000. </p>
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<figure><img src="https://publisher-ncreg.s3.us-east-2.amazonaws.com/pb-ncregister/swp/hv9hms/media/2025013114014_54d944286562f3ea93a4111a1605e2e77582ff890e6879d3e2a26f44616a27bb.jpg" data-media-id="editor_2" data-image-id="2025013114014_54d944286562f3ea93a4111a1605e2e77582ff890e6879d3e2a26f44616a27bb" data-rendition-name="original" width="3280" height="1848" loading="lazy" alt="Restoration efforts underway. "/><figcaption>Restoration efforts underway.<span>(Photo: Courtesy photo)</span></figcaption></figure>
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<p>With parishioners’ help, Elliot collected the broken, marred pieces that he could and then transported them back to his studio, which was more than two hours from Fort Scott. </p>
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<h3><b>Labor of Love</b></h3>
<p>To match the 19th-century statues’ original style, Elliot created molds of each station and studied “thousands of different images to see what the most desirable look and period of time” he had to emulate. Meanwhile, the surviving fragments needed to not only be cleaned, but sanded in order to remove three layers of paint dating back to the church’s founding, which felt like “an archaeological dig.” Additionally, to make the new Stations of Cross sturdier, he embedded a metal frame inside their structure to hold and evenly distribute the work’s weight. </p>
<p>For more than two years, six days a week, Elliot poured his time and energy into the restoration project. He donated his own money to the cause and even refused an income for a year. Yet he was not the only one. Ever the optimist, the artist turned the “bad situation into the biggest opportunity” for young, up-and-coming talent, starting an apprentice program, teaching them “the basic skills of restoration.” </p>
<p>“We treated it like a ministry,” Elliot said. Between Wichita State University, local Catholic high schools and volunteers, more than 30 people contributed to the effort, and it “seemed like whenever we needed some angels to show up, angels popped out of the air.” </p>
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<figure><img src="https://publisher-ncreg.s3.us-east-2.amazonaws.com/pb-ncregister/swp/hv9hms/media/2025013114014_db01cdf683c7aeb84d5ace853fffd05907bb4befbb805a0040dfc7f627de4873.jpg" data-media-id="editor_3" data-image-id="2025013114014_db01cdf683c7aeb84d5ace853fffd05907bb4befbb805a0040dfc7f627de4873" data-rendition-name="original" width="3392" height="1580" loading="lazy" alt="Team assembled to help in the rebuilding efforts. "/><figcaption>Team assembled to help in the rebuilding efforts. <span>(Photo: Courtesy photo)</span></figcaption></figure>
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<p>One of those volunteers was Jane Clark, a former parishioner of Mary, Queen of Angels and now a Wichita resident. In early 2024, she and her husband met Elliot during a 40 Days for Life event, praying outside of the city’s Planned Parenthood. </p>
<p>“He had a large, smoke blackened corpus in his car and joked that Jesus wanted to buy us a cup of coffee,” Clark told the Register. “When I learned that the crucifix came from our former parish, and that work on the project was slowed by lack of funds and workers, I offered my unskilled help.”</p>
<p>For Clark, who sanded and primed the figures, the work was an “intimate way to enter into each of the Stations,” and “it was a surprisingly spiritual experience.”</p>
<p>The only requirement Elliot had for interns, apprentices and volunteers was that they had to be Christians, though not necessarily Catholics, because, as he explained, “I don’t want anybody who isn’t — I don’t want their skepticism brought in” and imbuing those sentiments into the art.</p>
<p>“It’s not about us and our egos, but it’s about being in service to all these people and to God,” Elliot said. </p>
<p>However, due to the expense, the project still needs to recoup nearly $20,000. In conjunction with its own fundraising effort, Mary, Queen of Angels parish has supported <a href="https://www.gofundme.com/f/go-a-little-further-fund?utm_campaign=p_cp+share-sheet&;utm_medium=copy_link_all&;utm_source=customer&;utm_term=undefined">Elliot’s campaign</a> on its website homepage. </p>
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<h3><b>Having Our Church Back Again</b></h3>
<p>On an insurance form, the lightning strike was categorized as an “act of God” — however, the fire hardly felt like a providential act, with the church’s roof caved in and damaged interior. </p>
<p>Nevertheless, the Mary, Queen of Angels community, at first sorrowful and confused, reacted swiftly. In the aftermath, Father Burgess received between 300 and 400 phone calls from people across Fort Scott and Kansas who wanted to help. Parishioners came to the church “to start cleaning it out,” Father Burgess told the Register, adding, “Finally we had to make them stop because, while they had good intentions, the fire marshal hadn’t declared what caused the fire yet, so he still had to do his inspection.”</p>
<p>While the clean-up efforts were commendable, the pastor was more astonished by the increased Mass attendance and families entering the parish in the ensuing days, months and years.</p>
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<figure><img src="https://publisher-ncreg.s3.us-east-2.amazonaws.com/pb-ncregister/swp/hv9hms/media/2025013114018_333587262ea98760fad86dc430316ae3d01326ce91cd4c64073225d2e6f67006.jpg" data-media-id="editor_5" data-image-id="2025013114018_333587262ea98760fad86dc430316ae3d01326ce91cd4c64073225d2e6f67006" data-rendition-name="original" width="4000" height="2252" loading="lazy" alt="Restored statues being painted."/><figcaption>Restored statues being painted. <span>(Photo: Courtesy photo)</span></figcaption></figure>
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<p>“Normally, for a daily Mass, we would have about 20 people, but the next day [on Aug. 30, 2022] we had 200 people at it,” Father Burgess said. “But it’s interesting, when the lightning strike happened, we had about 290 families in the parish; two years later, we have 380 families.” </p>
<p>For the next two years, until the parish’s rededication Mass was celebrated in the St. Mary’s Catholic School gymnasium on Nov. 23, 2024, every Friday, volunteers and students set up 250 chairs and turned the space into a church as much as possible. Then, after 10 a.m. Mass on Sunday, “everybody took those down so that they could have their gymnasium to play and have P.E. during the week,” Father Burgess said, adding, “There were sacrifices made by young and old. It was worth it.”</p>
<p>Parish life also continued with renewed vigor, hosting fish fries during Lent, spaghetti dinners, chili cook-offs and an annual fall festival, among other events, all oriented toward fundraising for the church’s reconstruction — which totaled $7.8 million. </p>
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<figure><img src="https://publisher-ncreg.s3.us-east-2.amazonaws.com/pb-ncregister/swp/hv9hms/media/2025013114018_71d9b6ecb5fa76c9b3a3b476c48f61d42fee4841f11e6e7494faddf8bc69c176.jpg" data-media-id="editor_6" data-image-id="2025013114018_71d9b6ecb5fa76c9b3a3b476c48f61d42fee4841f11e6e7494faddf8bc69c176" data-rendition-name="original" width="4000" height="2252" loading="lazy" alt="The project became a labor of love for the entire parish community. "/><figcaption>The project became a labor of love for the entire parish community.<span>(Photo: Courtesy photo)</span></figcaption></figure>
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<p>As for rebuilding the church, completed by Simpson Construction and Alloy Architecture, it went according to schedule, with few interruptions caused by either weather or waiting for equipment and materials to be brought from Wichita or Kansas City. Ultimately, the new church was built to match the style of the previous structure, albeit with modern amenities and handicap accessibility. </p>
<p>However, insurance only covered between 80%-90% of the project; the rest had to be borrowed from the Diocese of Wichita. Through an active fundraising campaign, called the “<a href="https://www.mqaftscott.com/">Church Rebuild Fund</a>,” the parish needs an additional $600,000 to pay for the new church. Though a daunting goal, Father Burgess knows the money will come, trusting that the Lord will provide. </p>
<p>“A lot of [parishioners] are farmers and ranchers,” he said. “They’re not people of great means, so it’s taking everybody’s little gift to make that big gift add up.”</p>
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<figure><img src="https://publisher-ncreg.s3.us-east-2.amazonaws.com/pb-ncregister/swp/hv9hms/media/2025013114018_20dae095067c2cdfa39733ed98731e6db6a4462092efcc67f6cbb14d4be812f3.jpg" data-media-id="editor_8" data-image-id="2025013114018_20dae095067c2cdfa39733ed98731e6db6a4462092efcc67f6cbb14d4be812f3" data-rendition-name="original" width="4000" height="2252" loading="lazy" alt="Broken statues and mosaics are pieced back together. "/><figcaption>Broken statues and mosaics are pieced back together.<span>(Photo: Courtesy photo)</span></figcaption></figure>
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<p>Yet the reaction to the construction’s outcome could not be overstated. When the new church doors opened, many were in tears, particularly upon seeing Elliot’s “wonderful works of art,” the pastor recounted. Meanwhile, after years of waiting, the pastor was moved when he heard music from the reinstalled organ played for the first time. </p>
<p>In the end, what started as a disaster has led to a more vibrant and hopeful parish community, according to Father Burgess. “We’re still awestruck at the gift God gave us of having our church back with all the new bells and whistles,” he said. “We are very thankful.” </p>
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<br /><a href="https://www.ncregister.com/features/beauty-from-ashes-losing-church-strong-catholic-community">Source link </a></p>
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How Losing Their Church Grew Their Catholic Community| National Catholic Register
