Shelter From The Cold
A long-awaited new home for an ELCA community of “Winter Texans”
Like the light and heat radiating off a candle, the warm weather and warm people of Rockport, Texas, attract an annual population of “Winter Texans” – retirees who spend an average of five months out of the year in this idyllic coastal community.
With its beautiful shoreline on the sunny Gulf of Mexico, thriving arts community, and easy access to all the conveniences of nearby Corpus Christi, Rockport offered these part-time residents everything they could ask for.
Except a place to worship.
Through a loan secured from the Mission Investment Fund, the new-start congregation of Holy Cross Lutheran Church purchased land, and designed and built a church and meeting center that perfectly suits the needs of this diverse, friendly community of winter – and year-round – Texans.
It all started back in 1996. A small group of Rockport ELCA members began to meet each week for worship services in the living room of a retired pastor. The group was composed mostly of retirees, seeking refuge from the harsh weather back home in places like Minnesota, Wisconsin, and Michigan. In this cozy, informal setting, the new ELCA congregation of Holy Cross Lutheran was born.
With each passing winter, Holy Cross began to grow – outgrowing first the pastor’s home, next a community room at a local bank, and finally a rented storefront in the center of town. In 2001, when a local funeral home was going out of business, the determined congregation raised enough money through their collection plate and grassroots fundraising to purchase the real estate at its bargain asking price.
They moved into the funeral home, and time went on for the close-knit congregation. In the summers, the new location seemed to work pretty well. But in the winter, with membership swelling to 100-plus and growing, the makeshift church was bursting at the seams. There was no kitchen for post-service receptions. Far too few parking spaces. It soon became clear: With a developing sense of camaraderie between the Winter Texans and its growing numbers of year-round members, the Holy Cross community needed a space to truly call their own – complete with meeting spaces and classrooms for Sunday School, fellowship, meetings, and group activities.
It was right around this time that Pastor George Haynes came to his call at Holy Cross. Hailing originally from Ohio, Pastor Haynes had long since traded the lifestyle of the chilly north for the much more temperate Gulf Coast. Having served 20 years with a Lutheran congregation up the coast in Port Lavaca, Texas, Pastor Haynes could relate well to the sensibilities and needs of this friendly community. His easy humor and warm spirit contributed to the growth of the congregation, and it soon became apparent that his main task was going to be to find a permanent home for his perennial congregants.
A committee of congregants put a plan into action. After a long search, they found an ideal 11-acre piece of property on the outskirts of town, situated near the parks and mobile home communities where many of the Winter Texans lived. They set to work on the monumental task of raising enough money to buy the land and build the church that would be able to accommodate the congregation even when membership swelled in the winters.
The pastor’s enthusiasm for finding Holy Cross a home was contagious. But he knew he couldn’t do it alone. He enlisted the help of the Mission Investment Fund to secure a low-interest seven-year loan. The $300,000 in MIF funding matched the financial goals that Holy Cross’s stewardship committee planned to accomplish on their own, and doubled the budget for building the church.
Soon, “collaboration” became the name of the game. Mission Investment Fund Staff architect (and ELCA pastor) Bill Bentzinger assisted Holy Cross volunteer project manager Harold Hees to plan a church that would meet the community’s needs with the resources available. Pastor Haynes’ own son, also an architect, came up with the first plan for the new Holy Cross Lutheran Church building, and with the help of Bentzinger, a final working blueprint was created. Through the efforts of Hees and other volunteer resources within the community, Holy Cross was able to stretch their building dollars ever further than they thought possible. The resourceful team was even able to find a builder to create exact replicas of the pews they had used at the funeral home – so as not to waste anything they had.
There’s a certain sense of almost-electric energy among a congregation during the construction of a new church, and Holy Cross was no exception. Progress reports spread via word-of-mouth quickly throughout the community, and stewardship efforts continued. Multiple “field trips” were arranged to visit the new site. And a community-wide BBQ was held at the church in late fall of 2007, to welcome back the winter residents and infuse excitement for the project.
At long last, dedication of the new Holy Cross Lutheran Church of Rockport, Texas, was held on Feb. 25, 2008. After over a decade of patiently waiting, the ELCA community had a space to call “home.”
The new building provides the congregation much-needed features that many of the early members never dreamed possible. Three classrooms provide ideal facilities for Sunday School and Bible discussions. A music room and Sacristy add beauty and purpose. Ample office and storage spaces accommodate the congregation’s fluctuating attendance throughout the year.
Today, Holy Cross is a diverse group of year-round and part-time residents who all share the same sense of joy, pride, and appreciation for their new church building. Ask any member, and they’ll describe a real sense of coming together and camaraderie each fall, when the Winter Texans arrive and friends old and new greet each other with hugs and social invitations. “The building is undoubtedly, a well-suited facility, and the center of activity,” Pastor Haynes says, “but it’s our people -- so wonderful and such a joy to work with -- that really make my ministry so much fun.”