If you were going on a tour across Texas, there are many things that could help guide your road trip: Barbecue joints, swimming holes, even some notable gas stations.
But what about abandoned churches?
In her new book, “Faith and Ruin: Exploring the Abandoned Churches in Texas,” Adriana Perez takes readers on just such a tour, examining the forgotten sanctuaries of the Lone Star State.
Perez joined the Standard to discuss. Listen to the interview above or read the transcript below.
This transcript has been edited lightly for clarity:
Texas Standard: What drew you to this project? Why are you interested in abandoned churches?
Adriana Perez: I love road trips and I’ve taken so many road trips across Texas and you will always tend to see abandoned buildings, churches, schools, hospitals, all kinds of stuff
And, I don’t know, I started to ask myself how these places just ended up being left and started asking myself questions about it. I was really intrigued whenever I started doing research and learning about the history.
And a lot of the stories that I tell in there are more about how different things the government and society has implemented that kind of led to the abandonment of a lot these places.
Yeah, I mean, these churches – and then in the future the other abandoned places you will be talking about – they really tell a story. Is there something unique about these old churches in Texas specifically?
Well, you know, honestly, most of them have the same story. They’re all in towns in Texas that at some point were expected to grow with rail coming in and free transportation and all of that, and really ended up becoming parts of the state that didn’t end up developing. And so they were left behind.
But they’re beautiful. The architecture is amazing. And a lot of people, they try to preserve them, but you know, the cost in preservation, it’s kind of difficult.
A lot of them have been demolished since I visited them and others were repurposed and turned into Airbnb’s which, honestly, I think is super unique because it kind of brings attention to these smaller towns and people. They love going into and staying in unique Airbnbs and so I thought that was interesting.
» GET MORE NEWS FROM AROUND THE STATE: Sign up for Texas Standard’s weekly newsletters
Well, let me ask you about one of the churches that you include. It’s Mount Vernon African Methodist Episcopal Church in Palestine, Texas. For those of us who don’t know much about it, tell us about this church.
One of my favorites. It was actually built by freed slaves at the time and is one of the first churches that built subsidized housing whenever the state implemented a law that prevented or tried to prevent bread mining.
And so, historically speaking, the people that established that church were really seeking to help a community that at the time was… You know, that they weren’t paying attention to them and they were kind of on their own and so even implementing something like subsidized housing, it’s incredible because they were helping the community that they’re in and it was one of the biggest things that happened there.
Are there efforts to restore, revive, or even save these historic churches? Here in the El Paso area where I am, we have a mission trail with churches that date back centuries, and these have become big tourist attractions for people from across Texas and beyond. Do you see that happening elsewhere?
Yeah, it happens a lot in more historical, but also developed, cities like San Antonio. Houston even has a few of them. But, unfortunately, in smaller towns there’s just not enough people or enough funds to help support the preservation.
But what I have seen a lot is, like I said before, where like people are buying up the properties and converting them into Airbnbs and kind of repurposing while preserving the architecture. And I think that’s really cool, even doing it with like small jails – one-room jails that have been here in Texas.
They do it with that and I think that that’s an interesting way. Maybe not the most holistic way of preserving the church, because you’re not using it for a church. But I think, as long as you maintain the architecture, people can still come and enjoy the building.
