Saint Paul Seminary, Catholic Rural Life connections can be traced back to the very beginning [Video]

During one of his countless visits to agrarian Catholic communities around the United States, Jim Ennis met a priest in the backwoods of Louisiana who had turned a supersized out building into an after-school gathering spot for local youngsters. High school students from the parish would mentor those in junior high and elementary school, and pretty soon an entire generation of the city’s youth – not just Catholics – were learning how to lead, do better in school and stay out of the vices so easily accessible to modern rural children such as premarital sex, drugs and alcohol.

“That pastor,” said Ennis, the executive director of Catholic Rural life, “had a vision.”

Then Ennis drove 25 miles down the road. Another town, another parish, another rural community.

The priest, at first, refused to meet with him. He was embarrassed at the things happening in his community – many of the …