50 years of faith in Long Valley

LONG VALLEY  Bishop Serratelli on Sept. 29 helped Our Lady of the Mountain (OLM) Parish here mark a half-century as a “country church.”

Located in the Schooley’s Mountain section of Long Valley, OLM serves the spiritual needs of this rural faith community that grew from its roots as a “blue-collar parish,” which underwent a rapid period of expansion in the late 1960s and 1970s through the trade skills of volunteer parishioners and financial support of generous parishioners under the leadership of a pioneering priest.

Bishop Serratelli served as main celebrant and homilist of the 10:45 a.m. Mass in the church to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the raising of OLM from a mission to a parish on June 24, 1969 and also the naming of Msgr. George Dudak as its first pastor. He led the parish through a period of expansion that included building a rectory and also a wing with more seating and a parish center onto the existing church. The pastor at OLM for 30 years, Msgr. Dudak built on the legacy of previous priests, such as Father Nicholas Negola, who constructed the church when OLM was a mission in the early 1960s. Today, a mix of parishioners continues to worship and live out their faith under the leadership of Father Marcin Michalowski, pastor of both OLM and St. Mark Parish, also in Long Valley.

“Our Lady of the Mountain is a big, vibrant parish with people from young families, many with children, to older people, who have been here since the beginning and know everything about the parish,” said Father Michalowski, who arrived at the 1,500-family parish in 2017. Anniversary celebrations included a talk about OLM’s history on Sept. 18 by Msgr. Raymond Kupke, diocesan archivist and pastor of St. Anthony Parish in Hawthorne. “This country church is an alive parish,” the pastor said.

For the anniversary Mass, Father Michalowski was a concelebrant along with Father Slawomir Tomaszewski, an OLM parochial vicar; Msgr. Joseph Goode, a retired priest and previous pastor; Msgr. Raymond Lopatesky, a retired priest and weekend assistant, and Father Edward Davey, a retired priest and weekend assistant. After Mass, a brunch was held in Hackettstown for 200 people, including Father Dudak, now a retired priest and part-time parochial vicar of Resurrection Parish, Randolph. The parish’s other parochial vicar, Father Javier Bareno Castillo, was unable to attend, because he was previously scheduled to celebrate Mass at St. Mark’s.

Perched atop Schooley’s Mountain with Chester and Long Valley on one side and Hackettstown on the other, OLM became the first of three parishes in Long Valley ahead of St. Mark’s and St. Luke’s.

One of the younger parishioners is Daniel Bigos, who moved to Long Valley almost two years ago. He serves as a Fourth Degree Knight of the Knights of Columbus council for all three parishes. His wife, Laura, sits on OLM’s parish council and also belongs to the Colum­biettes and the Rosary Altar Society. Together, they have a two-year old daughter and year-old son. “When we first visited, the people were welcoming and very open. The church is beautiful. The parish also celebrates the Mass in a traditional way, which I like,” said Bigos, a sales director. “At OLM, it’s great to see young families like ours. It’s a good feeling. This is the environment that I want my kids to be raised in,” he said.

The history of OLM goes back to 1938, when Bishop Thomas McLaughlin of Pater­son saw the need for a church in the bucolic Schooley’s Moun­tain area of Long Valley — an idea that gained steam in 1944. He asked that the recreation hall of a nearby summer retreat for children from broken homes be transformed into a chapel. Father Walter Hayes, pastor of St. Joseph Parish in Mendham, celebrated the first Mass there on July 1, 1945. St. Joseph’s priests celebrated Masses in the chapel periodically until 1954, when mission status was extended to Chester and Schooley’s Mountain, because of the growing population, necessitating the start of liturgies all year round, according to OLM’s history.

In 1955, Bishop James McNulty of Paterson named Father Negola to the mission. He established many programs and expanded existing ones, such as the Rosary Altar Society, a choir and religious formation for first Holy Communion and Confirmation students. Then 22-acres of land on Schooley’s Mountain was purchased. An $85,000 church with “beautiful, laminated wooden arches that soar to the ceiling of the church” was built because of generous monetary donations and volunteer work of parishioners. The church was dedicated on May 30, 1964, OLM’s history states.

Because of its continued growth, the OLM mission was raised to parish status on June 24, 1969 with Msgr. Dudak as its first pastor. He teamed up with John Varga, a parishioner and carpenter, who led a team of tradesmen, also including electricians, plumbers and other people in the building of a rectory, church addition and parish center. By the early 1970s, 400 families called OLM “home,” according to the parish history.

“They [the volunteers] secured most of the building materials at cost and finished the projects in a year,” according to the history. “It was all accomplished without fund-raisers but there were big local contributors, who provided much needed cash. This was truly a labor of love and a story emblematic of the American spirit of volunteerism,” OLM’s history states.

Today, OLM carries on that rich legacy of faith through its many ministries, including several Bible studies, the Rosary Altar Society, the area Knights, the Columbiettes, a large religious education program, youth ministry and daily Mass, as well as the weekend Masses.

The anniversary Mass marked the first use of a new chalice that the Knights brought the parish for the occasion. OLM also has continued a scholarship for high school and college students, which Msgr. Dudak established, Father Michalowski said.

A parishioner for 49 years, Varga said that he never misses Mass at OLM. The 84-year-old, who once served as parish council president, recalled the early days of the parish with Msgr. Dudak, whom he called “a fantastic priest who attends to people.” The two remain friends today, he said.

“This was a blue-collar parish that drew people from all over and grew a lot. This tight-knit community always has been generous,” said Varga, who gave a reflection on OLM’s history at the brunch. He also praised the ministry of the three priests, who serve OLM today. “I enjoy my parish — and seeing something continue that we had started years ago,” he said.