Parish History

Following World War II…

…Hamilton expanded rapidly. St. James School was built in 1953 within Sacred Heart Parish. For the benefit of the parents and other parishioners in the district, Father J.B. Ryan, pastor of Sacred Heart, arranged for the celebration of Sunday Mass in the school auditorium.

By 1944 the district had developed to a size sufficient for the formation of another parish on the “mountain.” Thus “Most Blessed Sacrament Parish” was founded by Bishop Joseph Ryan in 1955. Msgr. J. Art O’Brien was appointed pastor. Mass continued to be celebrated in the school which was then renamed Blessed Sacrament School.

Building the Church…

A year later the membership of the parish climbed to 600 families. Parishioners began to dream of having a church of their own. That dream became a reality on 1957 when the church was built. The Parish Centre was built much later, in 1999. For 24 years, Msgr. O’Brien offered spiritual stability. Then Father Gerald Warren took on the pastoral leadership of the parish. After 10 years of faithful service, Fr. Warren retired, and was succeed by Msgr. Harvey Roach, who served in the parish until retirement 16 years later, June of 2005. Msgr. Roach also held many responsibilities beyond the parish.

Various associate pastors and priests in residence served in the parish right to the present time. Many caring parishioners continue to take great interest in the needs of the parish.

Present Day

The current pastor is Fr. Charlie Jordan.

As well as continuing to develop the parish as a community of faith and love, Fr. Ted Slaman has drawn our attention to needs beyond the parish, such as through Development and Peace and social justice concerns, and supporting various organizations that do Evangelization, Caring or Social Justice work both in Canada and in the Global South. With the Syrian situation, we recently supported a family in bringing their family members as refugees into Hamilton. With our Youth Minister, Rachel McNamara, we have also focused a lot of ministry on the children and youth of the parish.

In the last half dozen years, we have also welcomed the Iraqi and Mid-East Catholic community. The Chaldean Catholic Parish of St. Thomas, pastored by Fr. Niaz Toma, rent/use our church and hall regularly. Normally they have a very good attendance at their Sunday Mass at 1:00 p.m.

See  http://stthomaschaldean.ca/