NEW ORLEANS — When Chantal Walker first got a call that her church, The Hope of Glory, was hit by a tornado Wednesday, she was hoping for the best.
“[Hoping that] It was kind of brushed by and maybe just went through, and a few things may be displaced,” Walker, the Executive Administrator for the church, said.
Instead, she arrived to destruction.
“There’s nothing like being on ground zero until you’re on ground zero. It’s just like a movie until you’re actually in it,” Walker said.
The Infant Jesus of Prague, in Harvey, is in a similar situation. Much of the church’s roof blew off.
“We lost a lot of structural framing, and we’re going to have to get a structural engineer. Right now the main thing is getting git protected before the bad weather this weekend,” Randy Allard, the senior project manager for the Archdiocese of New Orleans disaster contract, said.
While there’s never a good time to have a natural disaster, the tornado came just days before Christmas. Now churches across the Westbank are forced to find a place to celebrate while also working to begin renovations.
“So we’re going to plan and take all the proper channels and proper precautions to make sure we’ll be in a place to meet and gather just to feel like everything is normal, and then we’ll make our long-term places for us to be together,” Walker said.
Infant Jesus of Prague will likely celebrate with a nearby parish if they can’t get their own. While it’s not ideal, they say they’re grateful for the church community.
“There’s a sister parish, St. Martha, but for the most part, the congregation here, the parish is an older community they prefer to worship at their home church, so we’ll see what we can do for them,” Allard said.
Despite the horrible conditions, the holiday spirit is helping them get through.
“We have been trained by the best, so we’re not about to survive this situation. We’re going to be overcomers,” Walker said. “It’s initial shock, it’s tears but then it’s we know what we’ve been taught, and we know there’s better on the other side.”