Our Church

  1. Home
  2. Our Church

History of our Parish of Jesus Mediator

On October 25, 1987 the Cardinal Luis Aponte Martínez blessed our temple with the name Parish of Jesus Mediator established at the Country Club urbanization in Carolina, Puerto Rico. Our parish is formed in the apostolic catholic faith as a meeting place for the members of our community and every resident of Puerto Rico who seeks to achieve a community life centered on the love of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, fostering Christian love and charity towards our neighbor.

The origin of our parish arises in 1957 when the Fathers of the Mercy arrived in the urbanization El Comandante to celebrate the Holy Mass on Sundays at the Community Center. In December 1959, the Fathers of the Mercy were transferred to serve in other communities, and at the beginning of 1960, the Trinitarian Servants of the Holy Trinity arrived with a sense of urgency to take charge of the Parish of Our Lady of Lourdes, temple that at the beginning welcomed the parishioners of the urbanizations Country Club and El Comandante. The Trinitarian Fathers immediately began repairing and maintaining the existing structures of the school. When the community saw the attitude of the Trinitarian Priests they began to help improving the conditions of the building. A group of educator nuns accepted to assume the administration of the School and thus began the development of the Our Lady of Lourdes School, constructed in the Demetrio O'Daly street in Country Club. The families who moved within the triangle that formed the avenues in Country Club congregated in the Church of Our Lady of Lourdes attending the Sunday Mass and the religious acts that were held. In 1961 to 1962, as the parishioners began to grow rapidly, Father Atanasio moved his office to the Isaura Arnau street in Country Club to supervise the construction of the Parish House located on the site of Demetrio O'Daly street in Country Club. Once Father Atanasio settled down on Isaura Arnau street, the establishment and organization of the new Parish of Jesus Mediator began, gathering in the Chapel of the Church of Our Lady of Lourdes.

READ MORE

Once the construction of the Parish House was completed, the construction of the new school of Our Lady of Lourdes began and with the growth of the urbanizations, the parish work increased, expanding to the whole community. Thus the complex of Associated Trinitarian Parishes (PTA by its initials in Spanish ) was created to work with the pastoral of the Churches together to reduce costs in the administration of the parish system. Led by the collaboration of Father Atanasio and Father Martín they began to celebrate Masses on Sundays in the community assigned to the Parish Jesus Mediator in Country Club. The sacraments of baptism and others were celebrated in the Church of Our Lady of Lourdes where they were registered because we were the parishioners of the Chapel of Lourdes. Once the main building of the new school of Our Lady of Lourdes was finished, Mass celebrations and religious ceremonies were held in the school's library. Later, after the auditorium of the school of Our Lady of Lourdes was completed, the Masses and religious acts were transferred to the premises that served as Jesus Mediator Parish by consent with The Adorable Sisters of the Precious Blood of Christ. The community was formed in groups to assemble all the necessary equipment to celebrate the Masses on weekends, being grateful with the new location that was very spacious to accommodate the parishioners who attended the religious services. The parish began to work in a more organized way with this new change, work groups were created such as the Adult and Child Pastoral (Catechesis), Maintenance and Cleaning of the premises, Ushers, Ladies of the Altar, Altar Servers, Activities and Readers. During this time of organization, the Sisters of the Most Holy Trinity and Sister Guadalupe Maria together with Father Atanasio contributed to accelerate the pastoral process of our parish and formed the group called "Fishermen of Men" that passed through the houses of the parish community and gathered our children to bring them to catechism classes. The young people also participated in the catechism classes and prepared them for First Communion.

At the end of the decade of the year 1970 through the donations of the parishioners and friendships in Puerto Rico and in the United States of Padre Atanasio, we began to plan the construction of a small Church for the use of our Jesus Mediator Parish. After presenting the plan for the construction of the temple to the congregation, it was decided to appoint a pro-construction committee to handle everything related to this work. Once the construction estimates were available as required, the application was submitted to the Archbishop's finance office and the application was approved along with the permit to use the land where the new Jesus Mediador Parish Temple would be located. The pro-construction committee developed several campaigns to raise the funds that were lacking for construction and many families cooperated to achieve the construction of the Church. Among these we must highlight the Iturregui family who cooperated in an extraordinary and special way to advance the construction work of the Parish not only with the financial contribution, but also by putting the workforce of family members. God bless each generation of each family that generously contributed to the construction of our Jesus Mediator Parish!

In the month of September of 1980 our Father Atanasio, was transferred to Los Angeles, California, and Father Tomas Norton, S.T was assigned as Pastor in Jesus Mediator. The construction of the Church began in 1985 and on October 25, 1987 Cardinal Luis Aponte Martínez blessed our temple giving it the name of the Jesus Mediator Parish. The Crucified Christ that appears on the altar wall was built in Italy, and was donated to our Church by a community in New Jersey that is dedicated to helping small Churches obtain articles and images for the altar. The piece was mounted on the wooden cross by the same Puerto Rican cabinetmaker who built the furniture of the Church. The images of the altar were donated by families of the parish at different times. The catechetical room on the second floor in the back of the temple was dedicated to Father Thomas A. Judge, C.M., founder of the Missionary Order of The Most Holy Trinity.