Catholics on a Mission

In the 1850s, a large percentage of Northwestern Rhode Island's immigrant community was French-speaking Québécois.  It is estimated that there were 350 French Canadian Catholics living in the Greenville section of Smithfield alone.  Despite these numbers, the Québécois of Greenville did not have a place of worship to call their own.  In 1858, that would change when St. Philip’s Parish was dedicated — the first Catholic church in all of Smithfield.  

The status of St. Philip’s was tied to the Northern American mill system (created about 10 miles away in Pawtucket by Samuel Slater). By the turn of the 20th century, the larger mills were concentrated in the eastern parts of Smithfield, including Georgiaville, Esmond, and Stillwater. As an influx of immigrants arrived to work in the mills, so did a demand for a Catholic parish in Georgiaville, where immigrants resided in mill housing complexes and boarding houses. St. Michael's Church was established in Georgiaville in 1875 and replaced St. Philip’s as the center of Catholic life in Smithfield. St. Philip’s was downgraded to a "mission" of St. Michael's Church.

Living and working in Greenville and traveling to attend Mass in Georgiaville would have been incredibly difficult for the average mill worker. In order to accommodate Catholics of Greenville, a pastor from St. Michael's would travel five miles by horse and carriage to hold Mass every Sunday at 9:30am.  The Mass was conducted in Latin and French, followed by children's religious classes. One of the biggest honors for attendants of Mass was to be selected to operate the hand pump for the organ, located in a loft above the altar. For years, a core group of thirty people attended the little mission.

Despite being built in a time of rampant bigotry towards Catholic immigrants, St. Philip’s developed not only as a religious institution, but also as a cultural center in Greenville. People of all denominations would come together for harvest suppers, square dancing, and clambakes.

The construction of the original St. Philip’s marked a significant cultural change in the rural parts of Rhode Island. Yet, within its design, we find similarity; St. Philip’s is a Catholic church built in the likeness of almost every other wooden Protestant church around it. The Québécois who built this church made an attempt to assimilate into the society around them, while still holding onto their own rich traditions and culture.  As far as anyone can tell, it worked, as St. Philip’s church was rebuilt three times over the next 100 years in order to accommodate the Catholic community of Greenville. Driving down route 44 on the Glocester—Greenville line, you can spot the current St. Philip’s Parish. While the building in the photo above sits shuttered, it remains an important landmark of Catholicism in Rhode Island.