I took the River Road from Montz to Metairie this morning and found great joy in stopping for a few moments to a scene of my childhood. The only damage it had from Hurricane Katrina was falling branches from the many oaks that surround it; nature's way of pruning the trees.
This church was built in the very early 1900's to replace the Little Red Church, the first church on the German Coast of Louisiana built in the 1700's. It is the church in which I was baptized and is part of the complex of a school and convent. It was there that I received my First Communion and the sacrament of Confirmation. I attended elementary school here and was taught by the wonderful Sisters of the Immaculate Conception, an Order founded in Louisiana.
The statue of St. Charles Borromeo is encased in front of the Church.
The original Red Church was a wooden structure painted red. It was also used as a trading post with the German settlers and the native American Indians. Ship captains used it as a landmark. When it was cited from the Mississippi River the captain began paying his crew and preparing for unloading ballast at the port of New Orleans downriver.