A new capital campaign at St. Mark Parish in Huntersville, “Growing Home,” seeks to raise funds for three building projects including a second parish hall, a larger Perpetual Adoration Chapel and a new rectory built on the parish campus. (Sketch provided)HUNTERSVILLE — St. Mark Parish in Huntersville got its start in 1997 with 250 families who initially met for Mass at a local bowling alley.
Fast forward to 2024, and the Huntersville parish is the spiritual home for 5,133 families and counting, with growth likely to continue as more Catholics move to the area north of Charlotte.
To meet the diverse needs of its current and future parishioners, St. Mark Parish has launched a $9.7 million capital campaign, “Growing Home,” to fund additions to the Huntersville campus.
“Response to the campaign has been very positive,” said Father John Putnam, pastor. “Folks have recognized we have needed this for a long time. These are plans we’ve been working on before the COVID-19
pandemic because we realized we needed more space.”
The campaign encompasses three building projects:
- A second parish hall named for Monsignor Richard Bellow, the parish’s founding pastor who died in 2023
- A larger Perpetual Adoration chapel
- A new rectory on Ranson Road for the parish’s four priests, plus additional visiting priests and seminarians
The total cost of the project is projected to be $13.7 million. The parish must raise 70% of that amount – $9.7 million – and then can finance the remaining 30%, Father Putnam said.
The parish’s goal is to focus on meeting its fundraising goal in 2024, then break ground in 2025.
Plans for the Monsignor Bellow Family Center include 11,000 square feet of meeting space that could be divided into smaller spaces for meetings, ministry gatherings and other parish activities.
A new 2,601-square-foot Perpetual Adoration chapel would be attached to the Monsignor Bellow Center, replacing the current smaller chapel inside the Monsignor Kerin Center. It would seat 75 people, up from the current chapel’s 20-seat capacity, to accommodate the devotion’s growing popularity.
Plans for a new rectory on the church campus would allow Father Putnam and the three other priests who serve the parish to “return home” to be close to the spiritual and pastoral needs of parishioners. Besides housing for the parish’s four priests, the building would have seven suites to accommodate visiting priests and seminarians.
“We will finally be able to build a house back on campus for the priests,” Father Putnam said. “We moved off site a couple years ago, and while it’s been nice, it’s difficult because the rectory is 15 minutes away. Folks want the priests to be on site.”
Continued growth at St. Mark Parish is the result of a number of factors driving growth in the Charlotte area as a whole, including an increasing number of people moving from the Northeast and from some western states because of jobs, good weather, nice neighborhoods conducive to raising families and a favorable tax system compared to other states, Father Putnam said.
“A lot of people are discovering North Carolina is a good place to settle, and St. Mark is seeing the results,” he said.
— Christina Lee Knauss