Century of ‘giants’: 100 years for Holy Ghost Church

North Knoxville parish celebrates a vast history on the centennial of its 1926 building

By Dan McWilliams

The “Cathedral of Happy Holler” experienced one of its happiest weekends ever on April 25-26 as Holy Ghost Church in North Knoxville celebrated the 100th anniversary of its 1926 building.

The church of Norman Gothic design, one of the most beautiful in the diocese—or, as Holy Ghost parishioners might say, anywhere—was dedicated on April 25, 1926. Pastor Father John Orr presided at a Novus Ordo Mass in Latin on the exact day of the centennial, saying in his homily that the priests and parishioners today stand “on the shoulders of giants” who came before them in the last century.

And on the following morning, Bishop Mark Beckman celebrated the 10 a.m. Mass, marking Good Shepherd Sunday, as the Fourth Sunday of Easter is called. Bishop Beckman, Knoxville’s fourth shepherd, has ties to two of the giants in Holy Ghost and diocesan history in Father Albert Henkel and Monsignor Xavier Mankel. Father Henkel was dubbed the “Bishop of Hinton Street” as he served as pastor of Holy Ghost for an amazing 38 years, and Monsignor Mankel served as pastor in Happy Holler from 1997-2014 after earlier assignments there as an associate pastor as a young priest.

A dinner following the Mass on April 25 took place in Henkel Hall in Holy Ghost’s basement. Pictures of Bishop Beckman and all previous pastors of the parish, which was founded in 1908, along with Father Orr’s photo, were placed on the walls of the parish hall along with historical photos and trivia displays.

It was no surprise that the high scorer in a 20-question trivia contest at the dinner was 87-year Holy Ghost parishioner Charles Chand-ler, baptized at the church in 1939.

Music from a Holy Ghost men’s choir recording dating to the 1960s played during the dinner in the hall’s Pope John Paul II Room, where easels displayed architect’s renderings for the renovation of Holy Ghost’s original church that stands next door (see story on page B3) in “Happy Holler,” as the neighborhood of the two buildings on Central Street is known.

‘Happy anniversary’

Father Orr was joined at the 100th-anniversary Mass on April 25 by associate pastor Father Valentin Iurochkin and parish Deacon Gordy Lowery.

“Buona festa a tutti—happy, happy anniversary,” Father Orr said as he began his homily. “This June, I’ll be 25 years a priest. That means this church is 75 years older than me. I was so happy in 2008—Monsignor Mankel let me come over here, and we did a 100th-anniversary Mass of the foundation of the parish, next door at the old church, and now here we are celebrating the 100th anniversary of this church.”

Father Orr presented his homily in an acrostic, a type of writing or puzzle where the first letters of sentences or clue answers spell out a message. Tenebrae services during Holy Week use an acrostic in the Hebrew language from the Book of Lamentations, and many psalms use acrostics.

“If you’ve ever been to Tenebrae, either more recently or when Monsignor Mankel did it, you might remember him singing ‘aleph,’” the first letter of the Hebrew alphabet, Father Orr said.

The pastor’s acrostic was based on “only God, no one else, enlightened by grace and faith and baptism.”

“Holiness is the reason for this parish, indeed the Church. Unity in faith, hope, and charity is our safeguard. Never surrender to sin or Satan or the glamour of evil. Defend the faith, your family, recommit to the next hundred years. Eternity awaits,” Father Orr said “Determination got us this far and will see us through. Yes to God and no to the devil, every day another chance to pray and to be faithful. Always remember God and His grace. Return frequently to receive God’s grace and to give Him glory. Salvation is assured to those who persevere.”

The “new” Holy Ghost Church has seen much in its 100 years.

“Lots of Masses here, lots of prayers. How many times have you alone prayed your rosary? That’s a lot of prayers. How many people have been married here or baptized here or buried from here? A hundred years of prayer,” Father Orr said.

Holy Ghost has had 14 pastors all-time and 11 in the 100-year history of the current church building, if Father John Dowling is counted both for his roles as administrator in 1997 and as pastor from 2014-19.

Four bishops of the Diocese of Nashville and four bishops of Knoxville have served Holy Ghost since 1926, when the church dedication Mass had the same readings as a century later, from Ezekiel 47, Psalm 138, 1 Corinthians 3, and John 2.

“We’ve had nine popes, eight bishops,” Father Orr said. “When I was doing my seminary studies, we had one pope, even through my ordination. That would be John Paul II and then Benedict XVI. I finished my (doctoral) research in the United Kingdom while Pope Francis was on the chair of Peter, and now we celebrate this anniversary, the dedication of this church, with Leo XIV on the chair of Peter. Pius XI was on the chair of Peter when this church was dedicated, same chair of Peter, same seven sacraments, same readings. Please God, may those who have gone before us marked with the sign of faith enjoy the bliss of heaven and intercede for us even as we remember them in our prayers.”

Bishop Alphonse J. Smith of Nashville, whose diocese at that time included all of Tennessee, was shepherd when Holy Ghost’s current church was constructed. He was succeeded by Bishops William L. Adrian, Joseph A. Durick, and James D. Niedergeses, who led the Diocese of Nashville when the Knoxville Diocese was founded in 1988. The Diocese of Memphis was erected in 1970. Bishop Anthony J. O’Connell was Knoxville’s founding bishop, followed by now-Archbishop Joseph E. Kurtz, Bishop Richard F. Stika, and Bishop Beckman, also a son of the Diocese of Nashville.

“It was interesting for me to note that amongst the eight bishops who have overseen this parish, four were Nashvillians because the whole state was under Nashville for the longest while. Alphonse Smith and Bishop Adrian, he was bishop a long time, almost 30 years. Bishop Durick, Bishop Niedergeses, who we call our grandfather in the Diocese of Knoxville. And now we’re on our fourth bishop, who’s also a Nashvillian. We had Bishop O’Connell and Archbishop Kurtz and Bishop Stika. God rest some souls there,” Father Orr said.

The Holy Ghost pastor said the 1926 church’s construction followed World War I and its parishioners have endured all of the wars since, while the edifice also came to be after 20 of the 21 ecumenical councils in Church history, with the Second Vatican Council as the only one to take place after the building’s completion.

Holy Ghost’s striking stained-glass windows from the 1920s depict two of what would be the mysteries of light of the rosary, added in 2002 by St. John Paul II. Father Orr gestured to his left toward one window and to his right toward another during his homily.

“For me, I’m always thrilled to note that our window over there, the baptism of the Lord, and our window there of the Transfiguration—those windows are 100 years old, give or take, right? But the mysteries of light as part of Our Lady’s rosary only date back to 2002, so Holy Ghost was ahead of the curve in monumentalizing those two of five mysteries of light,” he said.

Although Masses were in Latin when the current Holy Ghost Church was built, the reredos behind the altar with bas reliefs of the four Evangelists uses English for their names below their images, and each saint is shown holding a book of his Gospel open to the first page, with the opening verses also in English.

“Our reredos has the four Evangelists on either side of Christ the King, whose feast was new in 1926. The names Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John are written in English, not in Latin, and the first words of their Gospels, respectively, written in English, not in Latin,” Father Orr pointed out.

The Mass reading from Ezekiel spoke of water flowing out from beneath the threshold of the temple toward the east.

“Repeatedly, this passage of Ezekiel’s prophecy speaks about facing the east or ad orientem,” Father Orr said, adding that “the angels told the men of Galilee that this same Jesus would return just as He had left, which is to say from the east.”

Holy Ghost’s clergy and parishioners “indeed are standing on the shoulders of giants who did great things before us,” the pastor said.

“Now, it’s our turn to play our part in the centenary history of our parish (church). It’s safe to say some of us might not make it to the 150th or even the 200th anniversary on this side of eternity, but if we should be called to heaven before then, let us remember to pray for this place and those who gather here in God’s Holy Name, to worship the one God, the true God, the only God, in spirit and in truth,” he said.

Christ spoke of the temple of His body in the Gospel reading from John.

“When mother Church dedicates her church buildings, she considers that we are to be living stones ourselves, and our Lord reminds us of that explicitly in this passage from St. John’s Gospel,” Father Orr said. “When we receive Holy Communion—the body, blood, soul, and divinity of Christ—we say ‘amen,’ ‘Corpus Christi, amen.’ That one ‘amen’ refers to the mystery at hand, the Eucharist we are about to receive, but also all that mother Church believes and professes. Very powerful word: ‘I believe,’ ‘amen,’ ‘so be it.’ So be it indeed.”

A century of history

Parishioner and 100th-anniversary committee member Orpha Leitch gave Holy Ghost centennial ornaments to each family after Mass. The buffet dinner downstairs was provided by Brown Bag Catering, with Father Iurochkin leading the prayer before the meal.

Holy Ghost parishioner, historian, and anniversary committee member Pat Gang spoke at the dinner on the treasure trove of events that the century-old church has seen. Mr. Gang opened by thanking committee chair Marie Ward and fellow members Mary Wilson, Jim Richmond, Phil Birge of the parish office, Mark Williamson, Mrs. Leitch, and Mary Birge.

Mr. Gang said that Holy Ghost’s history “was a story you could tell your grandchildren. The centennial of this building is amazing.”

The parish historian quoted the 1989 movie “Field of Dreams,” where the character played by James Earl Jones said that baseball was the only constant in an America that had been “erased like a blackboard, rebuilt, and erased again.”

“But this place hasn’t” been erased, Mr. Gang said, “and please God it won’t.”

Bishop Thomas S. Byrne of Nashville announced the erection of Knoxville’s second parish, after Immaculate Conception Parish downtown, on Pentecost Sunday, 1907, and gave it the appropriate name of Holy Ghost. The original church building was dedicated the following year. The upper floor of the old church served as Holy Ghost School, which operated from 1908 to 1963, when—its establishment having been spurred by Father Henkel after his arrival as pastor in 1958—St. Joseph School opened in Fountain City.

“One of the reasons that I’m up here: my grandmother and my grandfather and those of my aunts and uncles who had been born by that point were in the congregation at Immaculate Conception when this parish was erected,” Mr. Gang said. “My grandfather probably sold the pipes for old Holy Ghost Church over there. My grandmother made some cloth napkins for the new priest, so we’ve been here. We came with the building. Then I thought about it—we came with buildings. My aunts and uncles all went to Holy Ghost School.”

Mr. Gang’s mother, Marian McLoughlin Gang, was in the first graduating class at Knoxville Catholic High School in 1932. Mrs. Gang, who died in 2001 at age 88, wrote a history of Holy Ghost Parish in 1976.

Her son Pat has a distinctive part in St. Joseph School history.

“My classmates and I were the first class to go all the way through St. Joseph School, from first grade to eighth grade. There was no preschool back in those days. We came with that building, so we’ve been here,” said Mr. Gang, who was commissioned by Monsignor Mankel to write The First Century of Holy Ghost Parish, a red hardcover book published in 2008.

The original Holy Ghost Church was used for only 18 years.

“As time went on, there had always been an intention that the old building was considered functional. It was built very strong, but they knew that it was going to eventually reach its limit, and in the early 1920s, it did,” Mr. Gang said.

The firm of Crowe and Schulte of Cincinnati designed the new Holy Ghost Church, and J.H. Dunn Co. of Knoxville built it at a cost of $300,000. Crowe and Schulte designed many buildings at that time, with Mr. Gang remarking that a church in Lexington, Ky., and another in Dayton, Ohio, resemble Holy Ghost.

Father Louis J. Kemphues, pastor of Holy Ghost from 1921-29 when the new church was built, as well as Father Henkel with St. Joseph School and Monsignor Mankel with later renovations, were good priests to have in charge when building needs arose, Mr. Gang said.

Trivia questions

Printed on the back of the dinner program were 20 questions about Holy Ghost history compiled by Mrs. Leitch. They included:

• What is the stone on the exterior of the current church? (limestone)
• The three entrances from the narthex to the nave symbolize what? (the triune God)
• True or false: the 12 light fixtures in the nave symbolize the Twelve Apostles (true)
• What year was the Schantz pipe organ at Holy Ghost purchased? (1952)
• Who was the parish’s longest-serving pastor? (Father Henkel, 1958-96)
• Which Holy Ghost pastor had a bridge named after him? (again Father Henkel, as the Coster Shops Bridge on Interstate 275 was renamed for him in 1990)
• Who was the associate pastor when a small child ran up the aisle after Christmas Mass and put a small stuffed lion in the Nativity scene next to the lamb? (Father Charlie Burton).

Mr. Chandler scored 17 out of 20 correct answers.

Mrs. Ward then asked those in Henkel Hall to raise their hands if they had been parishioners for more than 25, 35, 45, 55, 60, or 65 years, and finally Mr. Chandler’s hand was the only one left raised. She then asked who had been in the parish less than five, three, or two years and who had entered the Church this year, with one family having that last honor.

Mr. Gang asked the dinner attendees what high school Father Orr attended in Miami, and Rita Cook—the person who had the correct answer of Christopher Columbus High School—received a Holy Ghost sweatshirt.

Father Orr received a red Holy Ghost T-shirt for keeping his end-of-dinner remarks under 5 minutes in length.

“Thank you so much for coming and not only for our festivity tonight but Sunday by Sunday and some even day by day. I mentioned earlier we are standing on the shoulders of giants, not just the 100 years of parishioners and pastors and the like but even on the shoulders of the Apostles and our Lord Jesus Christ. When we live our lives according to grace in the faith, we glorify Him who made us to do just that,” he said.

The Holy Ghost pastor again referred to the reredos behind the altar, which depicts St. Mark—whose feast day is April 25—facing south.

“He’s not looking to the north but to the south because he’s the scribe for St. Peter. St. Peter told St. Mark what to write, with a little help from the Holy Spirit, so whether we read Matthew or Mark or Luke or John, stay close to the Lord,” Father Orr said before leading a closing prayer.

Senior parishioner

Mr. Chandler, who attended the old St. Mary School at Immaculate Conception as well as KCHS, has been a parishioner of Holy Ghost for nearly 90 years apart from time at college.

“I was baptized at Holy Ghost Church in 1939. I’ve gone to school and come back, and I’m here now. I’ve sung in the choir since I was in the third grade, both up at St. Mary’s and here and at Catholic High. I’m still singing in the choir,” he said.

Mr. Chandler said that it is “good that they’re taking care of the church again” with the renovations to the 1908 building.

The senior parishioner at Holy Ghost said his favorite pastor was Father Leo Baldinger, who served from 1954 to 1958, immediately preceding Father Henkel. He also recalled fondly Father Walter M.J. Emala, who was a Holy Ghost assistant pastor—as associate pastors were called then—during the 1950s.

“Father Baldinger had such a mild manner,” Mr. Chandler said. “The priest who took a lot of care of me was Father Emala. It was partly because in high school I had a driver’s license, being a farmer, and I used to drive him across the state. He had a siren in his car because he was a Fraternal Order of Police kind of guy.”

Mr. Chandler around 2000 completed a yearslong project to identify the figures depicted in Holy Ghost’s stained-glass windows, which were made by the Tyrolese Art Glass Co. in Innsbruck, Austria. Each window has a dedication at its bottom edge in memory of a Holy Ghost family, but the figures in the windows do not bear identifications.

“I asked 20 people outside the church if they knew who the windows represented and not a one of them did. I went home and asked my mom, who knew everything, and she didn’t know either,” Mr. Chandler said of his quest.

The Apostles depicted in the side windows of the nave are holding second-century symbols that allowed Mr. Chandler to ID them. The windows in the sacristy show Old Testament figures, while the nave has New Testament figures and four doctors of the Church—Sts. Augustine, Ambrose, Gregory, and Jerome—are seen in the back windows of Holy Ghost.

Committee chair

Mrs. Ward said she didn’t “feel like I’m the chair” of the anniversary committee because “we’re all working together.”

The Holy Ghost parishioner said she wanted to rent round tables for the dinner instead of using Henkel Hall’s rectangular tables.

“One of the things that I really wanted to focus on was the hall. We have rectangular tables, and I thought for something like this I really wanted the parish to come together and be able to communicate, so we rented round tables and chair coverings. I really wanted to make it a nice evening for everybody,” she said.

Mrs. Ward said she has been a parishioner only four years, and enjoyed signing up committee volunteers as well as “meeting other people here within the parish and also learn the history.”

The pastor speaks

Father Orr said “the shoulders of giants” include “many great parishioners and Father Henkel and Monsignor Mankel—these are some of the great priests. Now we have to live up to that legacy and at least try to meet them if not follow their good lead and do what we can to grow the kingdom.”

The 100-year history of the 1926 building includes untold weddings, baptisms, and confirmations. Father James Vann Johnston Jr., a son of Holy Ghost Parish and now the Bishop of Kansas City-St. Joseph, Mo., was ordained a priest at Holy Ghost, later served as its associate pastor, and celebrated his 25th ordination anniversary there. Father Mark Scholz was also ordained a priest at Holy Ghost.

“Somebody pointed out that between the St. James the Great and St. James the Less window, there’s a pew which was given in honor of James Vann Johnston, who would become the bishop of Kansas City-St. Joseph, Mo.,” Father Orr said.

Additional Holy Ghost 100th-anniversary events include the May Crowning held on May 2 and a parish picnic from 5 to 7 p.m. on Saturday, May 23, the day before the parish’s patronal feast day of Pentecost. A eucharistic procession will take place during the 10 a.m. Mass on Pentecost Sunday, May 24, and Bishop Beckman will celebrate a confirmation Mass at 6 p.m. on Saturday, May 30. A 25th-anniversary celebration of Father Orr’s priestly ordination will occur this summer.

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