A
message concerning Lake Charles area hurricane damage, and news of
the bishop's accident
Tuesday, October 4, 2005
Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ,
This is sent to provide you with an update on the status of the diocese as it relates to Hurricane Rita and based upon my on site visitation of yesterday, Monday, October 3, 2005.
Church of the Good Shepherd,
Lake Charles
I set out early Monday morning and drove to Good Shepherd, Lake Charles.
The
city of Lake Charles has been the recipient of much damage - both to buildings
and the city in general. My time there was spent with The Rev'd Jack Myers,
his wife Joan, their two boys, and with The Rev'd Deacon Boo Kay and a
number of teachers and parents that were doing clean up work in the middle
school playground. Deacon Kay heads the Bishop Noland Day School. The
church and school building sustained minimal damage, however, the yards
of both places took a real beating with respect to debris and trees. The
spirit of those working in the yard was encouraging, and they appeared
to enjoy my visit. Deacon Kay is doing a tremendous job of rallying the
school folks and pushing to get open within the next couple of weeks.
Sadly, the Myers have sustained a tremendous amount of damage to their
home and have much work before them. They had evacuated to Gulf Shores,
Alabama, prior to the storm and had just returned home mid-day this past
Saturday.
A service was held at the church on Sunday morning, sans electricity, and gathered about fifty worshippers. The Rev'd Jim Lueckenhoff helped much in bringing this together.
Holy Trinity, Sulphur
From there I journeyed to Sulphur, and even though I was unable to make
contact with anyone, I did tour the grounds of Holy Trinity Parish. The
buildings came through the storm with relatively minor damage - appears
mostly to be shingles. The yard however, is severely damaged. Those familiar
with the property will remember the "forest" that covered the back portion
of the lot and embraced the prayer gazebo; well, this is about totally
gone with most of the trees uprooted. I might add the clean up here is
going to be a real challenge. Father Hal Hutchison and his family rode
the storm out at the church and have remained in the area. Their home,
I understand, took a fairly severe blow from a large tree.
I headed back to Lake Charles and stopped by the school at Good Shepherd to touch base and say "hello" to Bishop John Lipscomb and his wife, Marcie. (The Rt. Rev'd John Lipscomb is Bishop of the Diocese of West Florida, and a former rector of Church of the Good Shepherd.) They have been over in the Diocese of Louisiana and the Rev'd Mark Holland graciously drove them over to see what had transpired. Deacon Kay took pity upon me and provided lunch for me.
St. Michael & All Angels, Lake
Charles
My journey then took me to St. Michael and All Angels where I found a
great amount of debris and some superficial building damage to the church
facilities. Canterbury House next door had some serious tree damage to
the property and the house itself.
It is my understanding that the Very Rev'd Peter Cook and his wife Nancy had originally evacuated to Houma, and were now in Minnesota where Nancy has family.
The "Our Saviour" property
The next stop proved to be the property that suffered most, and this being
the old Our Saviour property in the south part of Lake Charles. This property,
as most will recall, is now being used to house a wonderful ecumenical
outreach ministry. The building experienced a vast amount of exterior
damage and the interior was also damaged extensively due to the roof being
lost and the volumes of water related to the storm collapsing the ceilings.
Much work will be required to get this back into play.
I might add that this was also the setting of my "accident" that you will read about at the end of this message.
St. Andrew's, Moss Bluff
From here I traveled to St. Andrew's, Moss Bluff where I found a great
amount of debris from trees and neighboring yards. The office building
and church building appear to be in good shape, however, the senior centre
took some damage from falling trees. There is much to clean up around
here, and in addition, will be the repairs to the roof and possibly back
wall of the senior centre due to a fallen tree. The Rev'd Mitzi George,
vicar of St. Andrew's, and her family have been in Houston throughout
all of this and, as far as I know, remain there at this time.
Each of the areas, Sulphur, Lake Charles and Moss Bluff, for the most part were still without electricity and telephone service.
Trinity Church, DeRidder
Last on my schedule was Trinity, DeRidder where I found the Rev'd Richmond
Thweatt engaged in ministering to some of the evacuees that are still
being housed in the parish hall. While there is considerable damage scattered
about the area, the church plant was in relatively good shape with some
minor wind damage. Father Thweatt and his wife Josephine remained in the
area throughout the storm as they were caring for evacuees.
I might also interject here, that as previously reported, all of the clergy are accounted for and are scattered about in a wide variety of places. It has also been reported to me that a number of the clergy [retired and active] have suffered some serious damage to their homes.
The Bishop's Accident
As DeRidder was the last stop of my outing, I headed toward home, but
not before calling Susan to let her know that we needed to go to the emergency
room at Rapides Medical Centre when I got home. [Father Richmond Thweatt,
observing the condition that I was in, did offer to take me to the emergency
room in DeRidder] What? A few paragraphs back I mentioned that the former
Our Saviour site was the setting of an accident ... well, accident indeed.
For while I was climbing around checking out the damages, I concluded
by going over a fence to get out of the space that I had managed to get
into to check some of the most serious damage. This included a four foot
high chain link fence.
Under normal circumstances, a jump from the top onto the ground and proper bending of the legs would suffice ... but no, I landed with my right foot in a hole! Immediately my right ankle and foot turned in a direction that it ought not, and this was followed by similar behaviour on the part of my right knee which was not designed to bend to the right and left, but rather, forward and backward.
The culmination of my drive from the southwest part of the diocese to the emergency room ended at about 11:30 p.m. with the diagnosis of having fractured my tibial plateau just below the knee cap and a fractured ditstal fibula in my right ankle. I was sent home with my leg and ankle immobilized, my system treated with pain medication, and firm direction to see an orthopedic doctor with the next two days at most.
Thus, at 11:45 a.m. on Wednesday,
October 5, I will have the benefit of seeing an orthopedic doctor and
will find out about the plans for the days ahead. You will be advised,
and in the interim, I ask your prayers. Not just for me, but all who have
been and continue to be affected by that which has struck us with such
severity.
UPDATE ON THE BISHOP'S ACCIDENT
Blessings in abundance.
The Rt. Rev'd D. Bruce MacPherson
Bishop of Western Louisiana
dbm3wla@aol.com
318.442.1304
318.442.8712 fax