www.byzcath.org Forums General Discussions Photo Gallery St. Josaphat Ukrainian Catholic Church, Munster, Indiana

St. Josaphat Ukrainian Catholic Church, Munster, Indiana

St Josaphat is located in Lake County Indiana, technically the Greater Chicago area. The original church was briefly located in Hammond for a time. The present church was completed in 1968. The church's priest is Father Yaroslav Mendyuk.

Is that one picture two of the Station's of the Cross? Just curious. Is that church still doing that? I had always been told that was one of the latinizations that the Byzantine Ruthenians went through (my church). I did not know Ukrainian Churches also had latinizations such as the Stations of the Cross. Did they?

Tim

ps--gorgeous church, by the way. Great iconstasis.

Yes, those are the Stations of the Cross. I don't know if they do them, but I believe they are more common in Ukrainian Catholic Churches then among the Ruthenians. St Nicholas Cathedral in Chicago has iconic Stations of the Cross, as do several others I know of.

St. Michaels in New Haven, CT (Ukrainian) also has stations of the Cross.

Beautiful church. The Pontacrata (sp?) is especially glorious.

We removed our stations of the cross during our renovations and donated them, and other latinization items, to RC churches effected by the hurricanes in the south.

The Iconostas is beautiful and the interior of the dome must be facinating when lit up. I usually do not like modern, but this church seems to work well. I know the parish needs to generate money, but I would get rid of the pyrohy sign (very tacky) in the front of the church. How much nicer any icon would be.

Stivvy:

(1) To whom did you donate the stations of the Cross ?
(2) What did you put in their plalce ?
(3) Did any parishoners complain when you had them removed ?
(4) If there were complaints how did you respond ?
(5) What was the estimated cost of the project ?

I.F.

Jean Francois,

Interesting questions, but I want to know where you see the pirohi sign? I blew the pic up pretty well and I can't see it? Or, is it that you've been by there and seen it?

Many years,

Neil

Jean Francois--I agree with your take on "modern" versus "traditional." I don't normally like the modern type of architecture, but this one works. And I have seen a few others that also work. The big round ones that look like circus tents or courtrooms (mostly RC in my wanderings, but I could be wrong) certainly don't work. We have a local RC church that looks like a school gymnasium/cafeteria. They don't even have a crucifix or a cross in the sanctuary on a regular basis. They bring one in during the beginning of mass and take it back out. Not to my taste, at least.

Which begs the question--why not use a more traditional approach to church architecture? I understand tall ceilings and heating/cooling bills, but an architect should be able to work around that and still come up with something more traditional. But maybe this is a topic for another forum, a topic all it's own? I think I'll post one and see what kind of response we get.

Tim

It is visible, but just barely, in the last picture. It is sort of in the middle of the church itself.

Tim

Neil - it's there OK - white advert board by the hedge

When I was at the church, last Friday, there was a pyrohy sale going on, and it appeared business was good. Gotta do something to pay the bills.

Stations of the Cross can be an annoyance - I've known several of our parishes who actually boast that they are now the only parishes for miles around which still have Stations of the Cross and even the Latins come to perform this devotion!

Before someone points a finger at me, I should mention that the chapel we use is furnished with Stations of the Cross - nothing to do with us; they are there because it is a Latin chapel!

To top it off, I once privately visited one of our churches on a Sunday afternoon. The church was not furnished with the Stations, but this evidently did not inhibit the nuns who were in the place reciting the prayers - in Latin, no less!

I prefer the pirohi sign!

Fr. Serge

The most recent UGCC church I posted photos of prior to St Josaphat's, has 3D Stations of the Cross (not iconic) statues in the vestibule and 2 icons of the Sacred Heart. They're also Old Calendar and use Church Slavonic.

You know, I wasn't directly involved in which churches, but if you contact the diocease in the New Orlean or Houston area they can direct which churches are in need.

We just painted those spots.

Yes, there were a couple complaints. The old church priest had everything dedicated by individuals and had little plaques on them announcing the name of who the donation was from. So many took offense to having "their" station removed and such.

More or less, we ignored them. Father Bob Karl is good at defussing a situation privately and I believe this is how he did it with individuals.

The cost for our renovations over the past 3 years ran over $350,000.00. God blessed us with the selling of our old school biulding to a charter school system. We had a lot of structure issues that had to be corrected (roof, plaster, electrical, etc...)