NEW ORLEANS - Across the street from the Carrollton Avenue church, flies swirl over a smelly pile of trash, glass shards, crumbled plasterboard and discarded appliances.

Nearby, there’s a gaping hole in the window of an abandoned, mud-covered minivan that belonged to one of a handful of members who sought refuge in the church balcony, rationing communion bread and grape juice until rescue boats came.

Inside the church, remnants of the storm that turned New Orleans into a vast wasteland can be seen in the stripped floors and gutted walls.

They placed a makeshift pulpit under the leaking, yellow-stained ceiling and arranged donated chairs on the concrete floor.

But nearly four months after Hurricane Katrina, Carrollton Avenue and other New Orleans congregations remain desperate for financial help and work crews, elder Fred Franke said.

The church of Christ can be rebuilt in New Orleans, Franke said, but it will take “a tidal wave of God’s people.”

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