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When the pastor of St. Francis Xavier parish in Narrowsburg strategized how to festively celebrate the 150th anniversary of the parish that was founded during the Civil War, he had a different battle with which to contend: how to make the party affordable for all parishioners.
St. Francis Xavier is comprised of approximately 300 registered families, primarily blue-collar parishioners, according to the pastor, Father William Scully, O.F.M. “They’re a people of faith and they’re very proud of their heritage.”
Mindful of the financial constraints a number of his parishioners were facing, the pastor was adamant that the costs typically associated with such a celebration be kept as low as possible. “I wanted to make sure that everybody in the parish could participate,” he said.
Nearly 50 parishioners volunteered to supply hamburgers, hotdogs, chicken, cakes and more at a Sunday afternoon picnic Aug. 26 about a quarter of a mile from the church at Fireman’s Field, commonly known as Lander’s Field, on the banks of the Delaware River.
The picnic followed the Mass Cardinal Dolan celebrated at the church.
“Everybody just went the extra mile,” Father Scully said. “This was a celebration of community, and of everybody working together.”
That included representatives of neighboring denominations.
“It really became a celebration not only of the Catholic parish, but of the Catholic presence in Narrowsburg over these past 150 years.” Father Scully said.
Parishioners are advocates on behalf of the less fortunate, according to the pastor. “They’re there to help people and they’re constantly there,” he said. “That’s the thing that has struck me more than anything else. They have a wonderful faith and they want to do whatever they can. The people, they all pull together, no matter what the situation.”
On the parish property is the headquarters of the ecumenical food pantry, of which about 75 families from the township are recipients.
The parish’s outreach program provides back-to-school supplies for the township’s children in need—in late summer, a collection is taken up specifically for the cause. “We ask people to buy pencils, crayons and paper to help children out because it costs families a lot of money to buy those things.”
Additionally, financial aid is allotted to families of the township who struggle to pay their utility bills or who cannot afford to buy heating oil. At Thanksgiving and Christmas, families in need from the township are provided hearty dinners and Christmas toys and clothes for children.
The faithful of St. Francis Xavier also extend their helping hands outside the parish boundaries. Through the parish’s Change for Change program, parishioners collect spare change to help the less fortunate in other areas of the country and abroad. Additionally, the parish’s social peace and justice program aids others in need.
“Our thrust really is social action: what you do to the least of my brethren, you do to me,” the Franciscan pastor said.
Father Scully himself, the sole priest assigned to St. Francis Xavier, has contributed much to the parish since he arrived as pastor in 2006.
But he is quick to quell any praise parishioners bestow on him. “I always tell them, ‘This is not my church, this is your church,’” Father Scully said.
Throughout his time at St. Francis Xavier, the church has undergone a number of refurbishments, primarily by local craftsmen who are parishioners, including the installation of a new roof, air-conditioning, a new main altar and two side altars, interior and exterior repainting, new carpeting and, in the connecting hall where the parish religious education classes meet, new lighting.
The Civil War was being fought when the Narrowsburg parish was founded in 1862.
That year, Father Joseph Roesch, an Austrian priest who had been appointed the first resident pastor of St. Mary’s parish in Obernburg, built the first Catholic Church in Narrowsburg on Bridge Street.
In 1867, five acres of land were added to the parish property, including a cemetery.
According to the parish history, Catholics there had previously attended Mass at the Koferl residence, later the Buch residence, at Hunts Corners and then on the upper floor of a nearby tannery building at Deep Hollow Brook. That was pre-1862, when the building of the Erie Railroad brought many Irish and German immigrants to the area.
Around 1875, Father Gerald Huntmann, the first resident pastor at Callicoon, assumed the spiritual and temporal care of a group of parishes that extended the length of the Delaware Valley from Port Jervis to Long Eddy.
In 1876, Father Huntmann built a new church to accommodate the growing number of communicants.
By the early 1920s, the Narrowsburg congregation had grown threefold, necessitating a new and larger church. In 1925, Cardinal Hayes dedicated the present church, of which Father Cuthbert Cotton, O.F.M., was pastor. An extension for a church hall was added in 1951 and the rectory next to the church was built in 1960.
Since 1958, St. Francis Xavier has also had a mission church, Our Lady of the Lake, in Lake Huntingdon.
