The Orthodox Set: A Backyard Church in Mishawaka, and the Valley's Parishes Across the Line

The Church of the Assumption standing in Mishawaka since 1959; St. Andrew Greek Orthodox, first liturgy 12 September 1926; Sts. Peter and Paul Serbian Orthodox, organized 1911 — the last two South Bend, boundary-printed

The Mishawaka survival, whole: Mishawaka's one Orthodox congregation is also its smallest church building. The Holy Orthodox Catholic Apostolic Church of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary has stood in a Mishawaka backyard since 1959, built by an Orthodox priest behind his own house. The building's interior measures about eighteen feet by forty feet. The fullest account the record carries is the South Bend Tribune's of 2005, published under the headline "Reviving a dream: big hopes of little congregation growing for Orthodox church": by then the founding priest was deceased, his daughter Katherine Palsce kept the church, and the Rev. John Schmidt had since January of that year been celebrating Sunday liturgy there a few times each month — a congregation small enough to be served part-monthly, holding services in a backyard chapel forty-six years after its building. The Tribune's account names the church's company exactly: "There are two other Orthodox churches in the area, both in South Bend" — the Serbian and Greek parishes below. The founding priest's name, the congregation's jurisdiction, and its state after 2005 are not carried in any source reached beyond that account; they are named gaps, and the settling sources are the Tribune's own 2005 reporting file and the Orthodox jurisdictions' parish directories read for the city. What stands verified is the survival itself: an Orthodox church raised in 1959 on a Mishawaka house lot, still holding liturgy in 2005.

The Greek parish, at boundary size: St. Andrew Greek Orthodox Church is South Bend's. Forty-five Greek immigrant families who had settled in South Bend founded it; its first Divine Liturgy was held on 12 September 1926 at 418 West Jefferson Boulevard, South Bend, and its present church, at 52455 North Ironwood Road, opened in December 1983, designed by LeRoy Troyer and Associates of Mishawaka — the crossing the communities leg notes. It belongs to the Greek Archdiocese of America. No Greek Orthodox parish has been seated in Mishawaka in any source reached.

The Serbian parish, at boundary size: Sts. Peter and Paul Serbian Orthodox Church is likewise South Bend's, and the Serbian test the checklist sets is answered by it individually. The parish was organized in 1911, primarily by immigrants from in and around Lika, at 1634 Kendall Street, South Bend; its Kendall Street church was completed in 1912 and its first Divine Liturgy served that year. The old church burned on 28 August 1977, virtually everything destroyed but the baptismal font; the cornerstone of the present church on Keria Trail was laid in 1978 and the church consecrated in September 1979. The parish stands at 59248 Keria Trail, South Bend, under the Serbian Orthodox Diocese of New Gracanica–Midwestern America. The parish's own site dates its current building to 1972; its diocese's anniversary history gives the 1978 cornerstone and September 1979 consecration after the 1977 fire, and both statements stand as their records give them. No Serbian Orthodox parish has been seated in Mishawaka in any source reached.

The correction that stands: One eastern church in Mishawaka is not Orthodox and is not reclassified here: St. Michael the Archangel, at 712 East Lawrence Street, is a Ukrainian Greek Catholic parish of the Eparchy of St. Nicholas, Chicago, in full communion with Rome, carried whole in the banked fragment under the standing correction. Its own history adds the turn that makes the boundary matter: early in its course St. Michael's left the Catholic Church for one of the Eastern Orthodox churches — as the communities leg carries from the parish's own telling — and returned to full communion in the mid-1960s. That passage through Orthodoxy is the parish's history; it does not make the parish an Orthodox congregation in the present record.

Sources:

1. South Bend Tribune, 2005, "Reviving a dream; big hopes of little congregation growing for Orthodox church," via the ProQuest newspaper record — the Assumption church standing in a Mishawaka backyard since 1959, its eighteen-by-forty-foot interior, the deceased founding priest, his daughter Katherine Palsce, the Rev. John Schmidt's liturgies from January 2005, and the two other area Orthodox churches named as South Bend's.
2. The banked communities fragment, "The Greek thread" — the Assumption church pointed to the religion record; St. Andrew's forty-five founding families, first liturgy 12 September 1926, Ironwood Road church of December 1983 and its Mishawaka architects.
3. Sts. Peter and Paul Serbian Orthodox Church, parish site (stspeterpaulsouthbend.org) — established 1911 by Serbian immigrants; the current building dated 1972 on the site's account; the New Gracanica–Midwestern Diocese.
4. Serbian Orthodox Diocese of New Gracanica–Midwestern America, "St. Peter and Paul Serbian Orthodox Church: 110 Year Anniversary" (2021) — organized 1911 on Kendall Street, church completed 1912, the fire of 28 August 1977, the Keria Trail cornerstone 1978 and consecration September 1979; the building-date conflict printed whole against the parish site.
5. The banked communities fragment, Carpathian article, and the banked religion fragment, St. Michael article — the Greek Catholic correction and the mid-1960s return, pointed to and not retold.