History of St. Ben’s Parish
St. Benedict the Moor parish was established in Indianola, Mississippi, on March 5, 1953, by Bishop Richard O. Gerow and Father Theophane Kalinowski, OFM, Provincial Minister of the Franciscans.
An old, leaky, dilapidated grocery store was rented for the purpose of establishing the church. After necessary repairs, the building was ready by April 5, 1953.
In 1954, an old house was purchased. After renovations, the building was occupied on April 4, 1955, the anniversary of our Black patron saint, Saint Benedict the Moor. The church then moved to a former funeral home on the site of its current building on Church Street. On May 8, 1994, Bishop William Houck dedicated the new current church building.
Father Meinrad "Walter" Smigiel was St. Benedict the Moor's first pastor. Father Walter also represented the Franciscan mission that served the poor and underprivileged. In 1960, construction started on St. Benedict the Moor Center, which has served for decades as a religious, civic, social, and educational center for Indianola, and particularly the Black community.
Father Walter was an advocate of civil rights and social justice from the start, and he was in the forefront of the struggle here in Indianola. As well as personal participation, he opened the church and the center to the community at large.
As a result, during the turbulent 1960s, Father Walter, the church, and his small congregation were targets of calumny, open threats, and actual violence, including gunfire in the church. Father Walter served as pastor of St. Benedict until January 1971.
For the past five decades the church has been kept alive by faith through its own parishioners.
