Eric Reece
A few years ago, Matt Chandler – pastor of the Village Church – wrote a Bible study on the Apostles’ Creed. He noted the creed was used as a statement of the Christian faith that kept the church on the same page for centuries.
A part of many Christian worship services, some people are confused by the statement, “I believe in the holy catholic church.”
Here, catholic with a lowercase “c” means “universal.” This includes all churches: denominations that follow Christ. When used with a capital “C,” you are referring to the Roman Catholic Church.
It was in the 1950s when the big “C” came to Robbinsville.
During the Great Depression, Father William Howard Bishop was serving a parish in Clarksville, Md., when he dreamed of reaching people in rural areas of the country. He drew a map of the United States and darkened the counties where there was no presence of a Catholic Priest or Church. In 1936, this was 1/3 of the counties in the United States. He called these areas “No Priest Land, USA.”
He developed a plan on how to reach these areas, many in Appalachia, the rural South, and suffering from poverty and other problems. With the blessings of the leadership of his church, this was the start of the Home Missioners of America, which went on to be Glenmary Missioners.
In the 1950s, Glenmary came to Western North Carolina. There was one known Catholic family in Robbinsville and a few in the Fontana area. In 1958, Father James Wilmes – on staff at St. William Catholic Church in Murphy – came to Robbinsville and held Bible studies. Father Wilmes once was the only priest serving in a 4-county area of Northern Georgia.
In Fontana, Our Lady of the Church was a mission of the Murphy parish and held services during the summer months from 1954-90. One interesting fact is the chapel was located above the hospital at Fontana. I learned this from Harold Beasley, who told me he was born under the Catholic Church.
At first a building on Main Street, Robbinsville was used as a chapel for worship, Bible studies, prayer meetings and a clothes closet was added to distribute clothes to people.
Over the years, the building needed too many repairs and was demolished. But this was not the end of the Robbinsville mission: the mission moved to the Methodist church, where worship services were held on Saturday afternoons from 1973-88.
Father Wilmes returned to Robbinsville after thirty years in 1987 and located property on Tallulah Road and in 1988, Robbinsville had the Prince of Peace Church. The Glenmary Missioners had fulfilled their mission and in 2002, the church became part of the Diocese of Charlotte.
Wilmes died in Robbinsville in 2003. He had worked to plant the seeds and lived to see it move from a mission to a church.
Today, the Prince of Peace shares a pastor with the Holy Redeemer Church in Andrews. The pastor is Rev. George D. Byers and the church worships Sundays at 8:30 a.m.
Eric Reece is the faith columnist for The Graham Star. He is the pastor of Robbinsville United Methodist Church and can be reached via email, ereece@wnccumc.net.