Winchendon Catholics celebrate 150th anniversary

By Tanya Connor | The Catholic Free Press

WINCHENDON – Faith can be resurrected, Bishop McManus told members of Immaculate Heart of Mary Parish.
“It can be done; I’ve seen it,” he said with fervor. He was speaking at a Mass celebrating the parish’s 150th anniversary.
The administrator, Father Henry Ramirez, challenged the congregation in his homily to pray for, encourage, serve and be accountable for one another.  
At the reception afterwards parishioners raved about each other and their ministries and activities.
Sunday they celebrated again with a Mass with priests formerly stationed there – Fathers Leo-Paul J. LeBlanc, Francis A. Roberge and Carlos A. Ruiz – and with, another reception.
“We’re a tight-knit parish family,” said Deirdre Holt, a member since 2002 who helps with the flowers at the parish cemetery.
John Connor said he’s been there his whole life and hopes to be buried from there.
“The people are so great,” said Bonnie Betourney. “We love Father Henry.”
Her husband, Robert Betourney, 78, said he’s been an altar server there since age 8, except during military service.
“I used to ride my bike down for the 7 o’clock Mass,” he said. He also served Mass for Father Wilfrid A. Tisdell on Santa Maria, a structure with a ship’s bow, which the priest had built on Lake Monomonac, carting materials to build it by canoe.
“We have a very good bunch of workers who … keep this parish going,” Mr. Betourney said. He and others listed some of those fundraisers and activities which different parishioners run, including bazaars, meals and strawberry festivals.
“I’m just so grateful that we have” the parish, said Dawn Martin Turski, who helps lead First Saturday devotions and coordinate “Our Neighbors’ Kitchen” meals for those in need. More people come than workers prepare for, despite how they increase the amount of food each time, but there is always enough.
She said her family came from New Brunswick and has been at the parish for three generations.
“To receive the … sacraments (here) is very meaningful to us,” she said.  During the pandemic she helped with Masses the parish put on its website and Facebook page.
“We were doing that from the very beginning, because we wanted to bring the Mass to the people,” she said. “It was some sense of continuity and fellowship.”
Bishop McManus lamented how people are ceasing to practice the faith and becoming indifferent. He challenged parishioners to daily pray for fallen away relatives and invite them back to church.
Speaking of Jesus’ question to his disciples, and Peter’s answer, he said we too must answer: “Who do you say Jesus is?”
“The parish is the place where we learn to say, ‘You are the Christ,’” he said.
Father Ramirez spoke of an anniversary as a time for reflection, memories, thanking God and trying to learn from the past. He said what people are doing now leaves a legacy for the future.
Immaculate Heart of Mary was established as a parish on July 31, 1871. Accounts in The Catholic Free Press files tell the following story.
The first Mass on record here was celebrated in 1847 in a railroad shanty by a priest from New Hampshire. The opening of the Cheshire Railroad in 1848 brought Irish Catholics to town.
In 1855 Immaculate Heart of Mary began as a mission, when Father Matthew Gibson came occasionally from Fitchburg. A barn on Central and Locust streets was purchased and a 12-by-20-foot chapel set up in it. Father Turpin, who succeeded Father Gibson, converted the whole barn into a chapel.
When St. Martin’s in Otter River became a parish in 1864, its pastor, Father Thomas H. Bannon, came monthly to serve Winchendon. During his administration, Winchendon residents gave the Catholics land for a cemetery.
 Father William Orr, who succeeded Father Bannon in 1867, organized a church building society. His successor, Father Richard Donovan, tried to buy a Protestant church building, but it couldn’t be moved to the Catholics’ chapel site. In 1870 Father Patrick McManus became missionary to Winchendon.
In July 1871 Immaculate Heart of Mary became a parish, with Father Denis C. Moran as the first resident pastor. Trying to buy land, he encountered opposition, so a Protestant, Dr. Geddes, bought a 2 ¼ acre plot at Grove and Spruce streets and deeded it to Bishop Patrick T. O’Reilley of the Springfield Diocese, of which Winchendon was then a part, for $8,000. When the 120-by-60-foot basement was completed and roofed, it was blessed as Immaculate Heart of Mary Church. The rest of the church wasn’t completed until later; the parish couldn’t afford it.
“They are a good people, respected, but unfortunately it is only the old people who can live here on account of the want of business,” said Father John Conway, who succeeded Father Moran in 1880. “The work consists mainly in the manufacture of wooden ware, and the making of machinery for the construction of tubs, buckets, chains and lemon squeezers.” This observation is recounted by Father John J. McCoy in his book “History of the Catholic Church in the Diocese of Springfield.”
Father Conway improved the basement church; walls were frescoed and side altars and statues added. In 1900 Father John P. Hackett succeeded him, remaining pastor until he died in 1935.
On Sept. 19, 1909 Bishop Thomas D. Beaven of Springfield dedicated the now-completed church and confirmed 200 youth.
Starting in 1937 and continuing for at least four decades, the Sisters of the Presentation of Mary served the parish, primarily as teachers of religion.
When Father Hackett died, Father Wilfrid A.  Tisdell, curate there since 1927, became administrator, and, in 1942, pastor.
In 1936 he built a Shrine of the Holy Rood, with Stations of the Cross leading up to a representation of Christ’s tomb, in St. Mary’s Cemetery. The shrine was named for a fragment of the true cross there.
In 1938 Father Tisdell redecorated the church. It bore murals of angels against gold backgrounds. A shrine of Our Lady of Fatima had materials from around the world. In 1977, under Father Edgar Pelletier, the church interior was updated.