"St. Paul Catholic Church, near Center, Missouri, is historically significant as the mother church of the Roman Catholic faith in northeast Missouri, western Illinois and southeastern Iowa. In addition, its tranquil, rustic, wooded setting is singular in its evocation of a vanished era.
St. Paul Church:trace's Its beginnings to 1812 when a small band of Catholics left-Kentucky and Virginia as part of the great westward wave of emigration after the War of 1812. After wintering in Cahokia, Illinois, these pioneers continued their trek up the Mississippi River in search of an area for permanent settlement. When they reached the mouth of the Salt River, which empties into the Mississippi just above Louisiana, Missouri in Pike County, they disembarked and followed the stream to the vicinity of the present church of St. Paul where they founded a settlement.
Priests from Cahokia came by boat and mule pack to minister to this settlement until 1826. Late the following year, Father Charles Van Quickenborne, S.J., the Superior of the Jesuits at Florissant, Missouri near St. Louis, sent Father Felix Verreydt as the first priest to make a recorded visit to northeast Missouri. He was sent in response to a petition from 80 Catholics in the area who had written to Van Quickenborne to obtain the services of a missionary priest. Verreydt found the families there to be so scattered about nothing was done at this time to establish a permanent church or congregation.
After 1828 the missionary activity of the Jesuits in eastern Missouri and Illinois assumed greater scope and importance. It was financed by funds allocated to Bishop Rosati of St. Louis by the French Association of the Propagation of the Faith in order to save the neglected Catholics of the rural Midwest. As a result, in February, 1828, Father John Elet was sent from Florissant to northeast Missouri where he preached at the home of "Mr. Leake near New London on the Salt River". From 1829 to 1832 the Jesuits continued their missionary efforts in the area through visits three times a year by Father Verreydt from his St. Charles, Missouri headquarters.
In 1833 Bishop Rosati of St. Louis appointed Father Peter Paul Lefevre to the Salt River district as its first resident pastor. Through his efforts the first log cabin church of St. Paul was erected just north of the present church building by the autumn of 1834, on eighty acres of land donated by the Leake and Elliot families. Father Lefevre was born in Roulers, Belgium, the son of a farmer. He did his preliminary studies with the Lazarists in Paris and later volunteered for missionary work in America. He was ordained in St. Louis in 1831 and his career really began with his assignment to the Salt River district. For some years he was the only priest in residence from St. Louis all the way to Dubuque in northeast Iowa. He served in this area until 1840 when he retired with ill health to his native Belgium. He returned to the United States, however, in 1841 as the first Bishop of Detroit in which post he served until his death in 1889.
From 1840 to 1848 the history of St. Paul Church is obscured due to the lack of records. In May, 1848 Father John Canon O'Hanlon was appointed to the ministry in northeast Missouri. He met his congregation in the log church on the third Sunday of each month and stayed at the home of Ralph Leake nearby. Father 0'Hanlon remained in the Salt River district for two years before being recalled to St. Louis in 1850.
The decade from 1850 to 1860 saw a drop in attendance in the churches throughout the Salt River district which caused much concern on the part of Jesuits in the surrounding area. During this period, St. Paul Church was attended to by priests from other nearby parishes.
In 1860 Father Francis Kielty was ordained at Cape Girardeau, Missouri and was appointed the following year to the Salt River district. By this time, the log church which had been constructed in 1834 was deteriorating. Father Kielty, acting as his own architect, designed and constructed the present church with native stone. Most of the labor was donated by the parishioners and some of the 80 acres of church land was sold to pay for materials.
Father Kielty served until 1863 when he was transferred to St. Louis. There he served as rector of the Church of the Immaculate Conception for three years and as priest of the Holy Angels parish for thirty-eight years. He died there in 1906.
Services at St. Paul Church continued under various leadership and with varying frequency until October 31, 1966 when it was closed due to the reorganization of parishes due to a shortage of priests. The congregation joined that of St. William's Church in Perry, Missouri. At present the building is used only occasionally by its former parishioners who remember it fondly." - National Register Nomination
St. Paul Church built in 1860 of native Chouteau limestone continues to be very well maintained both on the exterior and interior. It serves as a historic site/museum and occasionally for services. It open occasionally for tours. There is an ice cream social and barbecue every summer which helps fund the upkeep and maintenance of the church.
Adjacent to the church is an active cemetery which dates to the start of the parish in 1828 and is the oldest active church cemetery in Ralls county. Among those buried in the cemetery are three veterans of the American Revolution.
The Ralls County Historical Society has published a book about the history of the church.
The church was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1979.