St. Louis
St. Louis is about 30 minutes from Prince Albert on Highway #2. It has a population of 525.
St. Louis has its own Credit Union and various other small businesses to serve the surrounding area. There is an active Roman Catholic Church in the village that also suffers from a declining congregation. Small town Saskatchewan will survive, maybe not as we see it today with our ageing population. Nonetheless, we are a very close knit group of people who share many of the same beliefs. St. Louis is a small, but vibrant community with a school from Kindergarten to grade twelve and about 230 students. We have two community halls, a two lane bowling alley, a skating rink and a three sheet curling rink, both with artificial ice.
At one time we were predominately a farming community, but being so close to Prince Albert, a lot of people work in the city and commute back and forth. The town of St. Louis is a very busy community. Two years ago while planning the construction of a new bridge, the discovery of a buffalo slaughter site was unearthed and could be the largest of its kind. There has been a large replica of the large animal made, and it will be set at a new site by the river in the village. We hope this will draw people into our town.
Emmanuel Church
Emmanuel Church sits on the south bank of the South Saskatchewan River. The first service to be held in our church was in 1931. There have been many changes over the last 73 years, but the most significant would have to be the construction of the new church in 1977 - 78. Our old church was damaged in an accident and it was necessary to rebuild a new one, so in spring of 1978, work began in the new church. We have 46 families on the parish role and about 14 families attend church regularly
Emmanuel church holds a regular service each Sunday morning at 9:30. The church seats about 75 people and has a full basement with a kitchen and two bathrooms. Various groups for quilting and other meetings use it.
We are a small group, but we have strong ties to each other and our church. We have, until the last six years, been self-supporting, but since then have been a mission church, receiving grants from the Synod office. This has been complicated by the fact that both churches in our Parish have an ever-ageing population. We believe that God will take care of us and our faith will carry us forward. We gather at the local restaurant every Sunday for dinner and fellowship after every service. This has gone a long way to draw the congregation together
We enjoy our B.A.S services and we have Morning Prayer from the B.C.P. on the months with five Sundays. We have declared this to be a day of rest for our minister and the lay readers would take this service. We offer the Priest the opportunity to choose their day off and as a parish, try not to bother him/her on these days.