72 Years of Saint Michael Memories

By Mary Anna Austin Dennard

Outside of my immediate family, Saint Michael and All Angels was my first community. My spiritual community. Let’s start at the very beginning (a very good place to start).

CHRISTENING

I was christened in Saint Michael’s chapel when I was three months old. It was May 20, 1954. And the holy water was poured on my tiny, bald head by my own Godfather—because my Godfather was the first Rector at Saint Michael, and my father’s dear friend, Rev. A.A. Taliaferro. Yes, I was christened by my Godfather, “Tolly.” I often wonder if that same baptismal font is still somewhere in the Chapel.

Father Taliaferro taught us that the soul enters the body at the first breath of life. I still believe that today. But our spiritual birth happens at baptism through a connection with the divine being of Christ. Therefore, 1954 was also the birthdate of my spiritual community.

My father Jac Austin served on the vestry, and more importantly, had been appointed as the first (in its 104-year history) business manager of the Episcopal Diocese of Dallas in March of 1956 and had administrative oversight under the jurisdiction of Bishop Avery Mason’s office. At that time, Bishop Mason was the bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of Dallas from 1946 until 1970. He succeeded Harry Tunis Moore who served from 1924 to 1946. Our intimate, serene Bishop Moore chapel is named after him. Daddy’s involvement in the diocese was an anchor for our family, and I felt the importance of the church connection from a very early age.

But my very first real memory is circa 1958. I am 4 or 5 years old. It’s after church and I’m holding my mother’s hand in the “brand new” Parish Hall adjacent to the Chapel just off the parking lot. I remember very clearly there was much excitement from parishioners. My parents were so proud of this new gathering space. It was the “everything space,” where we held meetings, classes, after-church coffee and donuts, and gatherings of every kind including choir practice. Children my age didn’t attend church. We were sent to Sunday School while our parents worshiped, but we joined up after church in that brand new parish hall.

THE SAINT MICHAEL SCHOOL

Nedra Niles was the first head of school. Mother said that Daddy “thought the children needed a school as well as a church.” And with the help of Tolly, the school was born in 1957. Right away it became so popular, that Daddy didn’t want to take any chances of my being accepted. So, he applied on my behalf the year I was born. I entered as a kindergartener in 1959. I remember Nedra as a tall, slender, gentle, and caring woman—just the kind of teacher any parent would want for their pre-K child. I sat next to Missy Gunn (Falchi) in those enormous wooden desks. We wore fancy petticoat dresses and smiled big grins for the photographer on class picture day. Nedra headed the school from 1950 until 1968 when she left to become the head of the Hockaday middle school.

ST. MICHAEL’S WOMAN’S EXCHANGE

In 1958, my mother and a group of her girlfriends got together and had the idea for the church to buy the “Woman’s Exchange” store from the Junior League. The purchase was for $1,500, and they founded the St. Michael’s Woman’s Exchange. The shop is still in its original location in the Highland Park Village. I used to volunteer in the back stock room as a young teen. I would take lunch breaks with the staff at the soda fountain next door at Skillern’s Drug Store. Still run today by Saint Michael volunteers, the shop proceeds go to those in need. Be sure you stop by and browse through a copy of True Blue: The Inspired Works of Anne Coke. (More on Anne Coke later.)

CHOIR PRACTICE

Every Tuesday after school we practiced our upcoming repertoire (in the multi-purpose parish hall) Cissy Humphrey will remember! Paul Lindsley Thomas taught us the value of spiritual music and the vocal techniques of choral singing. He was a wonderful, passionate teacher and choir director, and he challenged us. He also expected a lot from us in return. We rehearsed for hours and took our job seriously. The repertoire he chose was prolific. By 1961 we were performing full productions in the new “Big Church” sanctuary. The first was Noah’s Flood, by Benjamin Britten (correctly pronounced Noye’s Fludde as Thomas would remind us). All the young choir members were cast as animals. We entered from the narthex and proceeded down the aisle and on to the enormous wooden Ark that had been constructed in front of the altar.

The next large-scale production I remember was the dramatic cantata, The Death of the Bishop of Brindisis. What glorious music we made in that new space. I remember Paul’s wife, Joyce Thomas’, soprano vibrato reverberating within the gorgeous marble and stained-glass walls. And those costumes! Anne Coke, Father Henry Coke’s wife, designed and made all our exquisite costumes. What an extraordinary gift of creativity and artistry she had. Read her book if you haven’t already (available at the St. Michael’s Woman’s Exchange). I still don’t know how on earth she did it!

Choir was an enormous part of my spiritual life and the center of a joyous community for me. I sang in the choir for seven years and was very proud to wear those lush choir robes and caps, with James Avery medals on grosgrain ribbon worn around our necks, the color to represent our years of choir membership. We knew we were a part of something very special. Indeed, we were.

CONFIRMATION

When not wearing my choir cap, I wore a white lace handkerchief on my head. A head covering was de rigueur for every young lady in church at the time. Mother would help me bobby pin it in my hair as we ran out the door and headed to church service. By the time I was about 13 years old, I made my confirmation. Father C.V. Westapher (Father Wes) was my confirmation teacher. He was a man who believed fiercely in the traditions of the church. Cindy Creson Clendenen and I laugh during the relaxed chaos of the Joy Service in the Chapel thinking of how Father Wes might have disapproved! I had the utmost respect for him and he prepared me well for my confirmation. I was a serious student of the Rite I liturgy. (I still have a hard time with the modern one.) We met in a small group of about 10–12 students in the Saint Michael School classrooms on the first floor of the Northeast wing. This was a heady rite of passage for me. I was well aware that I had officially entered my sacramental adulthood at Saint Michael. Added bonus: I got a gorgeous new white dress and shoes too! And a beautiful white leather Holy Bible that I still have.

THE PRIESTS

In 1961 the church had a small staff. Tolly was Rector, of course, and Father McElyea (Father Mac) was Associate, and Father Cragon was Christian Education Director. I am reminded of this because it was printed on the Saint Michel letterhead in a February 8 missive that Tolly wrote to me about my upcoming 7th birthday.

However, I have limited memory of Father Mac or Father Cragon. But I have vivid and fond memories of Fathers Coke, Comegys, Kempsell, and Blackmon. Also of Father Henning, our Rector, and the extraordinary teacher, Dr. Bill Power. But it is the dear Reverend Pam Theodore, whom I adored as a mentor and a friend, who I still miss today.

ENTER FATHER MARK

In 1996 Rev. Mark S. Anschutz became our sixth Rector. Wow, I have been influenced by six different rectors, where did the time go? Mark instigated the development of the Jubilee Center which became a wonderful volunteer community for me. He was unapologetically demanding of our time of service, and tithing. In other words, he inspired me. He loosened up some of our long-held (albeit outdated) traditions of the church and broke a few rules. God bless him! It seems innocent now, but he allowed a black spiritual group to sing at our mother’s funeral in the Chapel. (Father Wes would have not agreed to that, and regarded it as a bit too secular) Mark also allowed personal homilies, which for years had not been a part of our church memorial services.

As another example, Mark reimagined the Nativity Pageant and truly took it to the next level with an elaborate production. This included having our daughter, Austin, make her dramatic entrance as Angel Gabriel standing on top of the pipe organ in the choir loft of the big church, as if her enormous costume wings were actually going to “lift her up if she falls.” (There were audible gasps from the audience.) That was the first and last time that was allowed!

Mark could deliver a sermon like none other. Such intelligence, insight, and wit delivered with the voice of a true orator; articulate and elegant. Always full of compassion and love, Mark and our family went through a lot together. He was always there to guide us and give us strength. And his prayers were, and continue to be, famously inspiring, deeply personal, and comforting. Always with a beautiful reminder of God’s love. I still have many of his prayers saved, and refer to them often.

FULL CIRCLE SPIRITUAL COMMUNITY

A few years after Father Mark retired and he and Peggy returned to South Yarmouth, Massachusetts, he graciously returned to Dallas just to christen our grandchildren. Oh, and did I mention that Father Taliaferro christened both of our daughters? This is the very definition of a full circle spiritual community!

Mark and I had important discussions about how it was known that Tolly was a member of the Rosicrucian Order when he answered the call to lead Saint Michael as our first Rector. Bishop Mason was well aware, and his only ask was that Tolly refrain from using the “mystical” nomenclature when speaking from the Saint Michael pulpit. Tolly abided and never spoke of it during his role as our Rector. I had the profund opportunity for ongoing spiritual study under Tolly until his death in 1993.