Better destruction than devotion: Indiana Novus Ordo parish kicks out Latin Mass community, gets closed by bishop several years later

An Indiana parish that ran to the National Catholic Reporter to stir up animosity against the Latin Mass community found out this week it will be closed due to lack of vitality.

St. Joseph's Church, Hammond, IN

On Sunday, the parish officially announced it would be closing sometime in 2026, following a series of discussions with other churches in the area over how to address demographic changes and a declining number of priests.

Yet things could have gone so differently.

St. Joseph’s Church in Hammond, just across the Illinois border from where the new pope grew up in Dolton, originally was set to host an Institute of Christ the King community. Under then-Bishop Donald Hying, the ICKSP offered Sunday and weekday Masses, while the parish continued Novus Ordo masses. Photos show a goodly number of faithful attending.

 

Bishop Hying in choir at a solemn Mass at St. Joseph's

However, the aging community in place complained to the National Catholic Reporter and succeeded in getting a hit piece published there in 2019. The backlash led to Bishop Hying reducing the ICKSP’s Mass schedule to Sundays and Holy Days of obligation.

The ICKSP paid $800 in rent per week to the parish. This meant that an otherwise failing parish was suddenly receiving over $40,000 a year thanks to the TLM presence.

At the end of 2022, partially due to the animosity from the parishioners as well as the dictates of Traditionis Custodes, Bishop Robert McClory moved the Latin Mass to Our Lady of Czestochowa in Merrillville where it has been ever since.

Meanwhile, its one source of vitality plucked out, St. Joe’s continued to struggle, as it reduced its weekend schedule to just one Sunday Mass. Two retired priests continued to offer Mass while an administrator oversaw several other churches. The church had no religious education, no school, and a neighboring hospital had been torn down, removing any necessity to have priests nearby.

The National Catholic Reporter said the battle between the Latin Mass and Novus Ordo people was Benedict vs. Pope Francis. Now Pope Francis is dead and so is the Novus Ordo parish. Meanwhile, the local Latin Mass community thrives.

Where there is tradition, there is the Faith; and where there is the Faith, there is life. Let us hope and pray that Pope Leo XIV will understand this fundamental truth and act on it.