St. Anthony of Padua

St. Anthony of Padua Church
3720 SE 79th Avenue

St. Anthony is located in southeast Portland just a few blocks west of the intersection of 82nd and Powell.  It is a new church building, dedicated in June 1999.  Here is a unofficial website that has as much information as the Parish's.

The church is surrounded by 127 assisted living units known as St. Anthony Village.  This village was former Pastor Mike Maslowsky's brainchild, designed to create an atmosphere similar to piazzas in front of churches in Italy where the elderly mingle with the citizenry.  (Unfortunately, Oregon lacks Italy's climate.)

As one might expect, there were a good number of seniors at the 10 am Mass.  There were many people of other ages too.  Of note was a large number of Pacific Islanders.  They were too big to be Filipino and too small to be Samoan.  My curiosity finally got the best of me and I asked two teens where they were from.  "Micronesia," they said.  I asked what island and they told me "Chuuk."  Apparently, this is an island group in Micronesia that used to be called Truk.  

I had heard of Truk.  I asked them how they found themselves in southeast Portland.  They seemed to misunderstand the question because they told me, "by airplane," supposing that that I must have thought they came by boat.  Among themselves they spoke a language I am guessing was Truk.   There were about 20 of the Chuuk islanders at Mass.  The women mostly wore cotton or silk dresses as you might see in Hawaii.  One even had a plumeria flower in her hair.  How they ended up at that parish in this city is still an interesting question to me.   

This article says that there was a St. Anthony of Padua church in Chuuk.  So perhaps the Micronesians were attracted by the Parish name?  That seems far-fetched but I don't have a better answer at the moment.  

Definitely an interesting parish that you may not have heard of before.