Trinity Lutheran sets sights on new site

October 15, 1998

By RICHARD F. BELISLE / Staff Writer, Waynesboro

photo: KEVIN G. GILBERT / staff photographer

GREENCASTLE, Pa. - The Rev. William DeHass will lead a brief service Sunday at Trinity Lutheran Church in Greencastle, then take his congregation to Jason Drive south of the borough to consecrate an 11-acre tract of land.

By this time next year, DeHass hopes bulldozers will dig into that ground to pave the way for construction of a new $500,000 church to replace the edifice at 145 East Baltimore St. The congregation began worshiping in that church in 1927 after breaking away from the Evangelical Lutheran Church on North Washington Street.

Last year, members of Trinity Lutheran, by a near unanimous vote, decided to abandon the 71-year-old structure in favor of a new building outside the borough. They opted for Antrim Township south of Greencastle because it is the fastest-growing area in the region, DeHass said.

The members bought the land from the family partnership of Greg and Dallas Strait and Larry Crouse. The family is creating Shadow Creek Meadows, a development surrounding the new church's land.

Although the sanctuary of the Baltimore Street church, which can seat 185, is more than adequate for the congregation's 115 active members, the rest of the building does not lend itself to changes the church must undergo to survive, DeHass said.

It can't be easily modified for handicapped access and its basement can't be converted to classrooms, church leaders said last year when the decision to build was made.

DeHass, 47, who has been pastor at Trinity for three months, said the Lower Susquehanna Synod of the Lutheran Church has already given Trinity two grants totaling more than $23,000 and will designate the church for a special mission that is expected to raise another $100,000.

On Sunday morning, the congregation will set a 12-foot wooden cross in the ground on the spot where the church will be built.

"The congregation will get together on the property for the first time and ask God's blessing for our land," DeHass said.

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