About San Felipe de Neri · Rodeo, New Mexico
Mission San Felipe de Neri is a small Roman Catholic mission church serving the tiny border community of Rodeo in Hidalgo County, southwestern New Mexico. It is one of 40 missions in the Diocese of Las Cruces and is administered as a mission of St. Joseph Parish in nearby Lordsburg. The mission belongs to the diocese's Copper Vicariate, whose vicar is Very Rev. Oliver Obele, and is served together with St. Joseph, Lordsburg, and the Mission of St. Jude, Cotton City, by Rev. Jude Okonkwo. Worship is offered on a limited bimonthly Sunday schedule, reflecting the mission's role as a satellite community for Catholics across the remote Bootheel region of New Mexico near the Arizona border.
- Patron
- St. Philip Neri (San Felipe de Neri)
- Rector
- Rev. Jude Okonkwo (priest-in-charge, serving St. Joseph Parish Lordsburg and its missions)
- Diocese
- Roman Catholic Diocese of Las Cruces (Copper Vicariate)
Why belong here
San Felipe de Neri Mission is a small, faithful Catholic community tucked into the remote Bootheel corner of New Mexico, offering the sacraments and Sunday Mass to Catholics who live far from larger parishes. As a mission of St. Joseph in Lordsburg, it is cared for by a resident priest who also shepherds two other small communities in the area, so worship is intentionally simple and limited — but it is genuine, diocesan Catholic life in one of New Mexico's most beautiful and isolated landscapes. For visitors passing through the Peloncillo Mountains or the Animas Valley, the mission offers a chance to share Mass with a long-standing rural Hispanic and ranching Catholic tradition on the Arizona–New Mexico border.
Mass times at San Felipe de Neri
Weekly Mass schedule
Identity and Patron
The mission is named after St. Philip Neri (1515–1595), the Florentine priest known as the 'Apostle of Rome' and founder of the Congregation of the Oratory. His liturgical feast is celebrated on May 26. As a mission in the Diocese of Las Cruces, San Felipe de Neri belongs to a long Hispanic Catholic tradition of honoring Spanish-saint patrons for rural worship sites in the Southwest.
- Patron: St. Philip Neri
- Feast day: May 26
- Jurisdiction: Diocese of Las Cruces
Diocese and Vicariate
San Felipe de Neri is one of approximately 40 missions in the Diocese of Las Cruces, a suffragan see of the Archdiocese of Santa Fe erected by Pope John Paul II in 1982. It falls within the Copper Vicariate, one of the diocese's six regional groupings, whose vicar forane is Very Rev. Oliver Obele (term 12/1/24–11/30/29). Other Copper Vicariate communities include Our Lady of Fatima in Bayard, Holy Family in Deming, St. Vincent de Paul in Silver City, and the St. Francis Newman Center at Western New Mexico University.
- Diocese: Las Cruces
- Vicariate: Copper
- Vicar Forane: Very Rev. Oliver Obele
- Mother parish: St. Joseph, Lordsburg
Clergy and Pastoral Care
Because San Felipe de Neri is a mission rather than a parish, it does not have its own resident pastor. It is shepherded together with St. Joseph Parish, Lordsburg, and the Mission of St. Jude, Cotton City, by Rev. Jude Okonkwo. This pastoral grouping reflects the diocese's practice of clustering small, geographically isolated communities under one priest-in-charge so that Mass and the sacraments can be sustained across the wide-open Bootheel region.
- Priest-in-charge: Rev. Jude Okonkwo
- Also serves: St. Joseph, Lordsburg; Mission of St. Jude, Cotton City
- Vicar Forane (Copper Vicariate): Very Rev. Oliver Obele
Contact and Online Presence
Mission San Felipe de Neri does not maintain its own parish website, and no dedicated phone or email is publicly listed for the mission itself. Inquiries about Mass, sacraments, or visiting clergy are best directed through the mother parish of St. Joseph in Lordsburg (telephone +1 575-542-3268) or through the Diocese of Las Cruces parish finder at rcdlc.org. The Diocese of Las Cruces provides the official online directory of parishes and missions.
- Mother parish phone (St. Joseph, Lordsburg): +1 575-542-3268
- Diocese of Las Cruces parish finder: rcdlc.org
- Predecessor site referenced for this mission: oldrcdlc.org/parishfinder