The Serra Clubs of the New Orleans area honored the 2018 Altar Servers of the Year at an annual Mass April 9 at St. Rita Church in New Orleans. Archbishop Gregory Aymond presented the awards to the following servers, who were selected by their pastors:

Three eye-popping dresses “sprout” from flowerbeds in the entrance foyer at St. Dominic School. Or do they? Closer inspection reveals the garments, modeled after the shift-style dresses popularized by the late American fashion designer Lilly Pulitzer, are made not of billowy material, but of stiff papier-mâché.

Since we are on the doorstep of softball and baseball playoffs, let me make a few observations of what may be about to happen: 1. I expect to see Archbishop Hannan and St. Charles Catholic face off on one of the diamonds at Sulphur’s Frasch Park in the Division II semifinal round on the morning of April 28.

When a large vase in St. Angela Merici’s gym began filling up with jelly beans, school principal Paige Bennett occasionally had to remind visitors to refrain from eating the candies. The jelly beans – each one dropped into the vase by a St. Angela student to signify that he or she had prayed a decade of the rosary – were a colorful reminder of the youngsters’ growing Lenten prayerfulness.

The cope of St. Jean Vianney (1786-1859), the patron saint of diocesan priests, has been kept in the archives of the Sisters of Mount Carmel since 1878, when Sister Aimee de Jesus Jugnet obtained it as a gift from Father Tocanier, who succeeded St. Jean as pastor.

Emma Nguyen’s 3-D portrayal of “Veronica Wipes the Face of Jesus” captures a rare moment of hope during Christ’s Passion. Veronica, who is seen kneeling on a cobblestone road, shows Jesus the cloth etched with the image of his face.

Archbishop Gregory M. Aymond will celebrate the annual Jubilarian Mass April 22 at 3 p.m. St. Rita Church, 2729 Lowerline St., New Orleans, for 27 priests, 11 permanent deacons and 31 religious women and men celebrating major anniversaries of ordination or religious commitment.

The “Code Noir” – or Black Code – of 1724 outlined policies and practices for governing and relations between the enslaved and the colonists in Louisiana.  The first version of the code was introduced in 1685 and was applied to French colonies in the West Indies in 1687, Guyana on the South American coast in 1704, and Réunion in the Indian Ocean in 1723. 

Film and Media team members at St. Augustine High School students recently won top honors in Louisiana in the Coca-Cola Company’s “POWERADE® Power Your School” video essay contest. Winning schools nationwide earned $2,000 each to upgrade and purchase new equipment by producing a winning one-minute video, “Share the Power,” that highlighted how students power through the day. 

Friends, family, former Jesuit schoolmates and coaches gathered at The Cannery to pay tribute to the late Daniel “Rusty” Staub who died on March 29 at age 73.  Rusty’s brother, Chuck, was one of several speakers to celebrate the former major league slugger’s life.

Alexandria Raney, an Academy of Our Lady senior, earned the President’s Volunteer Service Award for completing 288 volunteer hours at Second Harvest Food Bank. The award is sponsored by The Prudential Spirit of Community Awards in partnership with the National Association of Secondary School Principals (NASSP).

The jubilance was evident in the St. Katharine Drexel Chapel at Xavier University of Louisiana April 15 as Knights of Peter Claver members, friends and family applauded male and female Xavier students as they became charter members of the first university-based council and court of the Knights of Peter Claver.

In the nave of the former Our Lady of the Sacred Heart Church on St. Bernard Avenue in New Orleans – right across Claiborne Avenue from Circle Food Store – workers are creating six new rental units, part of Providence Community Housing’s development of a multi-use, residential-commercial facility encompassing 53 total apartments, commercial space and a community center.

The Saints’ stunning improvement over the last two seasons is cemented by the numbers. In 2015, the Saints’ point differential was minus-68. It improved to a plus-15 one year later, and, in 2017, the Saints scored 122 more points than their opponents in 16 regular-season games.

Academy of Our Lady’s Robotics team – named the Power Struck Girls – earned  the Imagery and Safety Recognition awards at the recent First Robotics Competition (FRC) Bayou Regionals. “These awards give testimony to their dedication to detail, their spirit of cooperation and the many weeks and months of preparation,” said team moderator Amy Morriss.

The following information is the latest available information for church weddings at various parishes in the Archdiocese of New Orleans as of April 2018. Contact the parishes to schedule wedding dates and for policies. The churches in the following list are among the ones that have celebrated the most weddings in recent years. It is not a comprehensive list. (504) area code is assumed unless otherwise listed.

It’s not often that a Catholic parish uses an “old-fashioned tent revival” as a way of moving outside the four walls of its church to evangelize a community, but that’s exactly what St. Raymond-St. Leo the Great Parish has done, with amazing success, for the last seven years.

Phillip Anglin, 54, grew up as a Southern Baptist Pentecostal and later as a Methodist in the north Georgia town of Buford – about 35 miles north of Atlanta – where the only Catholic church, Prince of Peace, was at the end of small road. It was simple, tiny and hidden in comparison to the sprawling Protestant churches of Buford’s Bible Belt.

Parents who prefer not to baptize their children in the hopes that they will “understand and ask for baptism” as adults lack faith that the Holy Spirit will act in their child’s life, Pope Francis said.  While some believe there is no need to “baptize a child that does not understand” the sacrament’s meaning, the pope said doing so would deny the chance for “Christian virtues to grow within that child and blossom.”

ATTIC ART IN APRIL, fundraiser April 21, 11 a.m-4 p.m. St. Alphonsus Art and Cultural Center, 2025 Constance St., New Orleans, $15 admission. Food, music, an Irish program, art items for all ages. Also, concert with Spencer Bohren, April 26, 7 p.m. Bohren plays Gospel, folk, blues and country music and will perform Hank Williams songs and other selections. Tickets: $15 includes three adult drinks. 482-0008; 524-8116.