By Jim Davis - Florida Catholic
Photographer: JIM DAVIS | FC
Frieze over the entrance to the church shows St. Anthony feeding the poor.
FORT LAUDERDALE | St. Anthony is the "Mother Church" of Catholicism in Broward County � and the first Catholic church between Miami and West Palm Beach. Its first home was dedicated in 1922 but the congregation goes back even further, to 1913, with 65 families.
The church's much-honored parochial school opened in 1926. Six years later, it became the first Catholic school in Broward with grades 1-6.
The first permanent home for St. Anthony's was a graystone structure on E. Las Olas Boulevard, which it outgrew by the late 1930s. A $350,000 fund drive by the pioneering Msgr. John J. O'Looney enabled the congregation to build the imposing, Spanish-style structure that stands as its home today.
The church's much-honored parochial school opened in 1926. Six years later, it became the first Catholic school in Broward with grades 1-6.
Photographer: JIM DAVIS | FC
Statue of Anthony, in the lobby of St. Anthony School, has him in a typical pose holding the Christ Child and lilies. One story says that the infant Jesus appeared to Anthony just before the saint died.
Meanwhile, the stones from the original building were taken apart and given to First Lutheran Church of Fort Lauderdale. The graystone fa�ade can still be seen at First Lutheran, west of St. Anthony's.
The parish's patron saint was born in Lisbon in 1195. He joined the Augustinian order but switched to the Franciscans after five members of that order were martyred in Morocco, determined to die in that land himself. Instead, he was thrown by a storm onto the coast of Sicily.
For a while he lived in a cave at San Paolo, but his eloquence came to light when he preached an impromptu sermon at nearby Forli. St. Francis himself then commissioned him to teach theology. Anthony became a renowned preacher throughout France and Lombardy, then finally at Padua in northern Italy, where he retired � a remarkable career for a man who lived only to the age of 36.
His preaching was so simple and forceful that he was called the Hammer of the Heretics. He is said to have spoken every language, and that even fish listened to him. On two occasions, it is believed, he miraculously shielded people from rain. Once, he restored a young man's severed foot. And St. Francis de Sales believed that Anthony could find any lost item.
In recognition of his brilliance, Anthony was canonized by Pope Gregory XI less than a year after his death. Pope Pius XII also declared him a doctor of the Church in 1946. St. Anthony's feast day is June 13.
