Contacts & Publisher

Subscription Form

Home  / News & Publications /  Michigan Catholic News / 2010 /  Our Lady of Mount Carmel in Temperance celebrates 50 years

by Robert Delaney of The Michigan Catholic
Published April 16, 2010

Robert Delaney | The Michigan Catholic Archbishop Allen Vigneron visits with Mike and Laurie Kruszka, and their children (from left) Mackenzie, 9, Anthony James, 4, and Mollie Anne, 6, following Monday’s 50th anniversary Mass at Our Lady of Mount Carmel Parish, Temperance.

TEMPERANCE — Carolyn Spotts was among more than two dozen charter members of Our Lady of Mount Carmel Parish among the nearly 400 people who turned out for the parish's 50th anniversary Mass Monday night.

"This has been a wonderful parish, a very active parish," Spotts, 68, said at the reception following the Mass.

"In fact, we've got a whole cemetery full of people, we've been so active," she joked.

Besides friendly people, Spotts also said the parish had been blessed with some very fine pastors, and she added, "including our previous pastor, Fr. Dan Nusbaum, who is my second cousin."

Linda A. Winkler, 62, another charter member, said, "I'm proud to say my father was one of the men who came out here and helped (founding pastor) Fr. (William) Hunt build this church, so we could have our first Mass in it on Christmas Eve 1960.

"We didn't have heat in the church, but everybody was warm on the inside, because we were able to come together as a parish," she added.

Robert Delaney | The Michigan Catholic Fr. Stephen Rooney, pastor, delivers some closing remarks at the conclusion of Monday’s 50th anniversary Mass.

But if Our Lady of Mount Carmel Parish's history is one of serving a close-knit rural community, its present has brought it a larger and more diverse membership, as Bedford Township (in which Temperance is situated) has increasingly become a bedroom community for Toledo. In fact, many parishioners live south of the Ohio line, said Fr. Stephen Rooney, the parish's pastor for the past two years.

"It's a great parish, a wonderful and very vibrant parish," Fr. Rooney said, adding that it is now the largest parish in Monroe County.

Not only has the parish grown, but the church building has as well, although the portion that Winkler's father, August Winkler, helped build is still there as part of today's structure.

Archbishop Allen Vigneron told the near-capacity congregation they should be thankful for their parish's history. "We are a family, the Christian people. It is right to give God thanks and praise for every day of this parish's 50 years of existence – and for all of its people," he said.

And he told them it is a special blessing to be a parish named for the Blessed Virgin, and that they should take her for an inspiration and model of faithfulness.

"The presence of the living Christ is here in Temperance. God loves Temperance, and God loves you," Archbishop Vigneron said. Although the archbishop grew up in the north of the Archdiocese of Detroit, he also has personal ties with this parish just inside the southern border of the archdiocese. An uncle, Fr. Leo Smith, was one of the priests to serve as its pastor, and Archbishop Vigneron had a chance to visit with Laurie Kruszka, whose father and the archbishop's father with childhood friends.

"My father and the archbishop father grew up together in Fairhaven, and their fathers were best friends," Kruszka said, adding, "My Mom and Dad still visit his parents."