Pat Shultz vividly remembers when the Archdiocese of Kansas City announced that she would be asked to leave the church she had attended her entire life.

Shultz grew up at St. John the Evangelist Catholic Church, but the archdiocese decided to start a new church in Lawrence, and about half of the members at St. John’s would be asked to be part of the new parish, Corpus Christi.

“It was very unsettling,” Shultz recalls. “People were very nervous, saying, ‘How could Lawrence (Catholicism) survive with Corpus Christi splitting the community?'”

Twenty-five years later, Catholicism not only has survived, it’s flourishing at the two main Lawrence parishes.

Corpus Christi, 6001 Bob Billings Parkway, will celebrate its 25-year history tonight with a Mass, dinner and celebration.

But in some ways, all Lawrence Catholics are celebrating a leap of faith that happened a quarter-century ago, with both St. John’s and Corpus Christi seeing record membership numbers.

“When I talk to parishioners, they never expected to grow that much here,” says the Rev. John Schmeidler, priest at St. John’s, 1234 Ky. “The only comment I’ve heard is they expected Corpus Christi to flourish and for us not to die out, but to become an urban church.”

Fast growth

Corpus Christi was formed because St. John’s had reached 1,300 families and was facing growth issues, according to news reports at the time. About 400 families west of Iowa Street were asked to break off and join Corpus Christi.

Treanor Architects Illustration

Corpus Christi members met at West Junior High School and First Baptist Church before opening their first building at Harvard Road and Kasold Drive. The current church building was constructed in 2000.

Today, there are about 1,150 families at Corpus Christi, or about 3,000 members.

“We’re growing at a pretty incredible rate as a parish – about 16 percent a year,” says the Rev. Mick Mulvany, Corpus Christi’s priest for two years. “Every time I see them dig a new development, I think, ‘Here we go again.'”

He’s referring to the rapid growth in the West Lawrence neighborhoods surrounding Corpus Christi.

But at the same time, St. John’s also has grown. It has approximately the same number of families and members as Corpus Christi does.

Corpus Christi Catholic Church Vacation Bible School children sing and dance during music class Tuesday morning at the church. Corpus Christi is celebrating its 25th anniversary this year.

Schmeidler says he’s not exactly sure why his church has seen such growth.

“It’s the Holy Spirit, I guess,” he says. “We have people at the university coming in. I don’t know where they all come from.”

Michael Podrebarac, consultant for liturgy for the diocese, says the growth at St. John’s and Corpus Christi – as well as similar growth at the St. Lawrence Catholic Campus Center – is largely due to the increasing population of Lawrence.

He says Lawrence, Johnson County and northern Topeka are the fastest-growing areas for the diocese, which includes 21 counties in northeast Kansas.

“It definitely was a situation that required good foresight,” he says of Catholic planning in Lawrence. “There definitely is a need now. Unlike what some other communities have seen, where the new church takes off and the old church settles into atrophy, St. John’s is as strong or stronger than it was before.”

Expansion project

As Corpus Christi is celebrating its 25th year, it is kicking off a $7 million capital campaign to significantly increase the size of its facilities.

Treanor Architects Graphic

The current $8 million structure at Corpus Christi includes a sanctuary, offices, meeting space and a school that houses grades K-6.

The additions, slated for completion in fall 2007, would include a commons area, gymnasium, courtyard and classrooms for its school and Christian education program, as well as new parish offices. The extra space eventually would allow Corpus Christi to have grades K-8 at its school, which recently came under separate leadership from the Catholic school at St. John’s.

Marilyn Dobski, a Corpus Christi member who is leading the capital campaign with her husband, Tom, says she’s confident the building project will be a success.

“I just see an energy that is there in the church,” she says. “It just seems like lots of people have kind of come together to get to know each other.”

Catholic ‘legacy’

Meanwhile, St. John’s is looking for building options of its own.

Corpus Christi’s sanctuary holds 1,200, so it can get by with just three Masses in a weekend. But St. John’s smaller sanctuary means that church must hold six Masses each weekend, scaled back to five in the summer.

Schmeidler says his church also needs more space for social gatherings.

The growth in Catholicism in the heart of Lawrence is a relief to those who were at St. John’s 25 years ago.

“It was disconcerting in the early years, the fact that one group had to leave,” says Mary Gauthier, a church member since 1960. “Now, we’re at 1,200 (families), and there’s nothing we can do about (the growth).”

Gauthier says she hopes any building project at St. John’s keeps the historical character of the old sanctuary.

And that, says Corpus Christi’s Mulvany, is one of the keys to Catholic success in Lawrence – two churches offering a variety of options to members.

“We’re producing an incredible legacy,” he says. “We have two unique, beautiful campuses, which is a great legacy for the Catholics in Lawrence.”