The Holy Innocents parish was established in October 1905 on the southern outskirts of the Polish Downtown district in Chicago, not far from the churches of the Holy Trinity and St. John Cantius, where numerous German and Irish immigrants settled as well. At the request of the Poles, Father Franciszek Lange, the parish priest of St. Josaphat parish, was appointed to organize the new parish. Its dedication was connected with the liturgical veneration of the children who were killed in Bethlehem on the order of the king of Judea, Herod the Great, who wanted to kill the newborn Christ. The events of the so-called “Massacre of the Innocents” are described in the Gospel of Matthew, and the cult of the murdered children dates back to early Christianity.

Thanks to Fr. Lange’s efforts and his own financial contribution, the church of St. John the Evangelist (built in 1867) was purchased from German Lutherans, along with a brick presbytery and a school, which was opened in October 1905 and handed over to the Nazareth sisters. One of the rooms in the school building was temporarily turned into a chapel, where the parish priest Jan Zwierzchowski celebrated the first Holy Mass on October 22.

Initially, the parish, where Fr. Zwierzchowski served with great devotion until 1960, consisted of 144 families, and about 160 students were enrolled in the school. Over the following years the school was extended, and in April 1910 the parish began the construction of the church and of the presbytery, which was completed within six months and then enlarged in 1914. The old presbytery was extended to house the Felician sisters, who had taken over the management of the school in 1906.

The construction of the church progressed much more slowly, mainly due to the social unrest and strikes which took place in Chicago at that time. In June 1911, the foundation stone was consecrated by Bishop Paul Rhode, who had donated several thousand dollars to the parish at the beginning of its existence. The church was dedicated on October 20, 1912 by Archbishop James E. Quigley.

In the years 1914-1915 a new school was erected, and in 1923 a convent was built for the constantly growing number of nuns working as teachers. The 1920s were the peak of the development of the parish, which at that time comprised about 15 thousand parishioners and 40 brotherhoods and religious societies. In 1927 the parish magazine “Młodziankowianin” started to be published, and in 1941 the bulletin “Kalendarzyk tygodniowy”. Volunteers from the parish fought in both world wars, and the society “Towarzystwo Imienia Jezus” sent parcels to soldiers fighting at the front.

At the beginning of the 1950s the parish began to decline, as the residents started to escape to better districts, due to the construction of the Kennedy Expressway nearby, among other things. The Poles were mainly replaced by Puerto Ricans and other Latin American nations. In 1975, the Holy Innocents parish was enlarged by the territory of the closed St. Columba Church, founded by the Irish in 1859, thus making the formerly Polish ethnic parish territorial and multinational. This state deepened in 1990, when St. Boniface parish, founded in 1865 by emigrants from Germany, was also incorporated into the Holy Innocents parish. At the turn of the millennium Spanish-speaking ministry, which now dominates the life of the parish, developed dynamically. One Mass in Polish is celebrated every Sunday.

The Holy Innocents church was designed by the Worthmann & Steinbach architectural studio, and it was John G. Steinbach who put most of the work into the preparation of the sketches. The church, built of pressed brick and steel with limestone details, was designed for around 1400 seats. It was given the form of a threenave basilica with a shallow transept and a semi-circular chancel enclosed by a sacristy and a utility room. The crossing of the naves was emphasized with a powerful dome, making this impressive space the dominant feature of the interior. On the outside it is enclosed by four smaller domes, crowning the staircases. The façade of the church, with its Baroque Revival pattern at the top, is enclosed by two massive towers, the last story of which is openwork and houses the bells. A triaxial stone portal with an interesting decoration referring to Gothic tracery leads to the interior.

On the day of its dedication the church was equipped with all the necessary furnishings, such as altars, pews and the organ. The statue of Our Lady had been transferred to the new church from the old chapel. The multi-colored stained-glass windows with Christological themes had been brought from Austria. However, practically nothing of the original decoration of the church has been preserved, due to the fire which broke out in May 1962. The renovation works undertaken by the parish priest Father Klaudiusz E. Klarkowski and supervised by architect George S. Smith included installing the new marble altars with mosaic and a balustrade at the chancel. The walls were decorated with a polychrome with the life of Christ and Mary and depictions of saints. One of the scenes also shows Our Lady of Częstochowa as the Queen of Poland, whom the advocates of Poland are addressing: St. Stanislaus and St. Adalbert, St. Hyacinth, St. Hedwig, St. Casimir, St. Stanislaw Kostka, St. Josaphat, St. Andrew Bobola, St. John Cantius, and the martyrs Benedict, John, Isaac and Matthew (the so-called Polish Holy Brothers).

In the following years, when Fr. Edward Pająk was the parish priest, new chapels were set up: the Missionary Cross (1971) and Our Lady of Częstochowa (1973), to which the mosaic was made in Rome. In the sacristy, on the other hand, the banners of the Polish school at the parish of the Holy Innocents and of two Polish women’s religious societies, Stowarzyszenie Niewiast Różańca Świętego and Bractwo Dziewic Różańca Świętego, have survived to this day.

Chronology

1905  - erection of the parish of Holy Innocents

1910 - construction of the presbytery and commencement of the construction of the church

1911 - consecration of the cornerstone for the church

1912 - dedication of the church

1914-1915 - construction of a new schoo

1923 - construction of a new convent for the Felician Sisters

1962 - church fire

1963 - second dedication of the church

1983 - church fire

Text originally published in a book issued by the POLONIKA Institute.
Katarzyna Chrudzimska-Uhera, Anna Sylwia Czyż, Jacek Gołębiowski, Bartłomiej Gutowski, Polish parishes and churches in Chicago, Warszawa 2019, pp. 259-266.