September 27 marked one month since Hurricane Laura touched down in Louisiana and destroyed homes, flooded churches, businesses and even displaced priests. Houses of worship were left without a roof and people hoping to return to the pews will find them destroyed.
When Hurricane Laura’s path was projected between Houston and New Orleans, the millions in the region shuddered. Memories of Katrina, Rita, Ike and Harvey were all too familiar and too recent. Meris Bridger had seen hurricane damage before, but never to her own family’s home.
Archbishop Jose H. Gomez of Los Angeles, president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, has asked his fellow bishops to consider having their parishes take up a special collection to aid dioceses and parishes stricken by recent natural disasters.
Hurricane Laura destroyed six churches in the Diocese of Lake Charles, left a dozen others “highly compromised” and did heavy damage to chancery offices.
