February 17, 2011
By Staff Reporter
For a few hours during the peak of Hurricane Katrina’s fury, the parish church and adjoining rectory might have been more accurately described as Our Lady in the Gulf.
The land is dry again, and the church that has withstood three hurricanes is still standing.
But there is another gulf for parishioners and the rest of this town’s inhabitants to contend with.
It is the astonishing difference between what once was, and what is left behind in the aftermath of a storm that, in Tracey’s words, “was no lady.”
In a cellphone interview occasionally drowned out by the noises of chainsaws and bulldozers, Tracey this week described a scene of devastation that even now is only a little less than total.
In recent days he has officiated at five funerals stemming from the hurricane and there will be more in the days ahead.
This is not what the Killawalla native was quite planning on when he was assigned as pastor to a picture postcard church he first worked in as a young curate over thirty years ago.
“This church survived the hurricane of 1947 which had no name. It survived Camille in 1969, and now Katrina,” Tracey said.
But there are degrees of survival.
“A 35-foot wave washed over us and we’re 24 feet above sea level,” he said
Our Lady of the Gulf is made of brick and the outside brickwork had recently been resealed.
However, there was nothing to stop the waters of the Gulf from surging into the church’s interior.
“The water, which was up to four feet deep inside the church, washed away all our pews, tore up the floor, ruined the plumbing and destroyed the electrical wiring,” Tracey said.
The wind also tore up the church’s roof and the church clock is stopped at 4.50 a.m. – likely the precise moment when the huge wave collided with the building, which is only yards from the ocean.
In all, Tracey estimates the damage to Our Lady’s could run anywhere from $1.5 to $2 million.
To make a bad situation worse, the rectory was, according to Tracey, gutted.
“We lost all our parish records,” he said.
Add to these losses the parish safe, which is resting somewhere on the bottom of the Gulf of Mexico, and the parochial car.
Our Lady of the Gulf has a large enrollment, about 1,500 families. The parish also ministers to three schools, an elementary, a girls’ high school and a separate school for boys.
Damage to the three runs to many millions.
The diocese of Biloxi is only insured up to $35 million, according to Tracey, but early estimates put the combined damage to diocesan facilities at over $100 million.
Some losses are likely to be permanent.
Tracey has spent much of his time in recent days liaising with the enormous numbers of volunteers who have come to the Bay St. Louis to help in recovery efforts, part of what Tracey said has been a “tremendous outpouring” of aid and sympathy.
Both are sorely needed.
“There are volunteers from as far away as Wisconsin, but even with all the effort the streets are still piled high with debris.
“There are still 24,000 homeless people in this county alone. We are still waiting for trailers from FEMA,” Tracey said referring to the much-criticized Federal Emergency Management Agency.
“The trailers are stockpiled about 10 miles away but there are not enough contractors to move them where they are needed,” the pastor said.
Some parishioners, he said, were living in tents on church property.
Saying Mass meanwhile, has been a bit of a moving feast.
“We say it on the steps of the church and a community center which has a floor, but no walls or roof,” he said.
Some of the parish children are currently attending school in Chicago but the high school is planning to reopen on Nov. 1.
Tracey spends much of his days with a cellphone, pen and notepad.
The worst of Katrina’s wrath is to be found in the loss of life.
But tending to the traumas of the living is also at the top of Tracey’s daily to-do list.
“We’re going to have to face the psychological impact of this well down the road, when this is not front page news anymore,” he said.
“People are still wandering around with photos of missing loved ones. And there have been some suicides.”
To counter such sadness, Tracey has taken comfort from all the volunteers coming into the area to help.
“It makes you believe in the goodness of people,” he said.
Tracey, of course, has to keep his personal life in some sort of order too.
In the immediate aftermath of the hurricane, he was given a travel trailer by a parishioner, but it was quickly condemned by FEMA as uninhabitable.
He has been offered the use of a nearby condo until the end of this month, but after that his housing prospects are more than a little uncertain.
“What then I don’t know,” Tracey said.
“Hopefully, I’ll get a trailer from FEMA.”