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Sacred Heart Parish at Notre Dame, 1842 — Belgian Sacred Heart, South Bend, organized 1896, church 1898 — Sacred Heart of Jesus, Lakeville, merged with St. Jude 2008
Sacred Heart at Notre Dame: Sacred Heart Parish is the oldest continuous parish founded and staffed by the Congregation of Holy Cross. It was begun together with the University of Notre Dame in late November 1842 by Holy Cross priests and brothers led by the Rev. Edward Sorin, C.S.C. A larger church completed in 1848 was named for the Sacred Heart of Jesus; it was replaced in 1871 by the present church, which Pope John Paul II raised to a minor basilica in 1992. The parish worships in the basilica’s crypt. As South Bend grew, Sacred Heart’s boundaries were drawn down to form new parishes, among them St. Joseph in 1853, St. Patrick in 1858, Christ the King in 1933 and Little Flower in 1937, on the parish’s own history.
The Belgian Sacred Heart: The Sacred Heart named alongside St. Stephen’s in early South Bend parish lineages is a different church: the Belgian national parish on Thomas Street. The few Belgian families in early South Bend worshipped at St. Patrick’s. By 1896 they numbered about fifty families, and the Rev. Henry A. Paanakker, C.S.C., ordained at Notre Dame in 1896, was appointed pastor of the Belgians with instructions to organize a Belgian parish; Alerding’s diocesan history heads the parish 1896. The parish’s own later history dates the church’s establishment to 1898, when the Thomas Street church was completed. This Sacred Heart is the mother church of Corpus Christi Parish: in 1960–61 the parish was transferred to northwest South Bend under the Corpus Christi name, and the original Thomas Street church held its last services on 27 August 1973. Its records are kept at Corpus Christi.
Sacred Heart of Jesus, Lakeville: A third Sacred Heart, at Lakeville south of the city, enters the South Bend record through St. Jude Parish. Under Bishop D’Arcy’s decree, Sacred Heart of Jesus Parish, Lakeville, and St. Jude Parish, South Bend, were merged effective 1 November 2008 to form a new parish under the patronage of St. Catherine of Siena, in part for a more equitable distribution of priests; Sacred Heart had recorded 27 baptisms in the five years 2002–07 against St. Jude’s 115. In 2010 the combined parish went back to being St. Jude and Sacred Heart of Jesus parishes again.
Sources:
- Sacred Heart Parish, University of Notre Dame, “Parish History,” sacredheartparish.nd.edu — the 1842 founding with Notre Dame, the 1848 and 1871 churches, the 1992 basilica elevation, and the parishes formed from its boundaries.
- H. J. Alerding, The Diocese of Fort Wayne, 1857–1907, Sacred Heart Church history, as transcribed for the St. Joseph County genealogical pages — the Belgian families at St. Patrick’s and Paanakker’s 1896 appointment.
- Corpus Christi Parish, “About Our Parish,” corpuschristisb.org, and the Sacred Heart parish page of the St. Joseph County genealogical site — the 1898 establishment, the transfer to Corpus Christi, the 1973 closing of the Thomas Street church and the custody of its records.
- Today’s Catholic, 19 October 2008, and St. Jude Parish history — the 2008 St. Catherine of Siena merger and its 2010 reversal.