Bishop leads celebration of 175th anniversary of Our Lady of Mount Carmel Parish

BOONTON  Altar servers carried long rows of candles — either with long wax stems or in small lanterns — into Our Lady of Mount Carmel (OLMC) Church here at the beginning of a Mass on July 17 to mark the 175th anniversary of OLMC Parish. These flames symbolized the faith community today, which draws on its rich history in its continuing efforts to answer Christ’s call to become “a light to the world” and live out lives of worship and witness.

For 175 years, OLMC has spread the light of God’s love from the “church on the hill” on Birch Street — at first in a small wooden structure and later in one made of stone. It was in that Gothic-styled church where Bishop Kevin J. Sweeney served as main celebrant and homilist of the anniversary liturgy on July 17, the Feast of Our Lady of Mount Car­mel, the parish’s patron. One of the concelebrants of the Mass was Father Daniel O’Mullane, who became OLMC’s administrator in 2015 and its pastor in 2017.

“What a joy it is to celebrate 175 years of faith dedicated to the Blessed Mother,” Bishop Sweeney said at the beginning of Mass to the congregation that filled the church to standing room only.

After the Mass, the parish continued its celebrations with a pot-luck lunch on Birch Street, which was closed off to traffic for the event. It was followed by a procession with a statue of the Blessed Mother in honor of her feast day in the streets around OLMC. It ended at a local public school with a festival, featuring games.

Filling OLMC Church for the Mass were current and former parishioners and former and current students and faculty, and teachers of OLMC School. During its long history, the parish has produced dozens of priests and religious brothers and sisters, who have shined their light of Christ in the Diocese — and throughout the world.

“The story of Mount Carmel is that of a faith community that has drawn sustenance from its history of struggle — usually caused by economic downturns — and strong faith to connect to its mission: to become the flame of God’s love and bring other people into that encounter with Christ,” Father O’Mullane said. “Over these 175 years, the parish has become a refuge and a pillar of strength for generations of immigrants, who are from different backgrounds but come together as one heart and one voice in worship to God, so we can be of service to God’s people,” the pastor said.

A major part of OLMC’s successful faith story has been the parish school, perched on a hill over the church across Birch Street. Originally opened in 1863, the school retooled its approach in 2017 to offer students a classical Catholic education. The school immerses students in the sacramental life of the Church, helps them develop as leaders, and provides many opportunities for them to serve others. When Father O’Mullane arrived in 2015, the school had 77 students. This coming fall, it will have 300, he said.

“Throughout the years, Mount Carmel has seen Catholic education as a ministry of the parish,” said Father O’Mullane, adding that the school is getting ready for expansion of its facilities for the fall. The school reclaimed the former convent building from the Diocese’s Domus Bartimaeus house of discernment for men and is renovating it to accommodate six new classrooms and administrative offices. “At the 175th anniversary Mass, we also celebrated the growth and vitality of the school,” he said.

The history of OLMC starts with the Irish, who came to the area in the early 19th century, employed by the New Jersey Iron Company. They walked 18 miles to St. Vincent Martyr Parish in Madison to attend Mass. Sometimes, Masses were celebrated in the homes of local faithful, according to OLMC’s history.

OLMC was founded in 1847 as a Mass station in Boonton, developed by St. Vincent Martyr and attached to a “new parish in Dover.” New Jersey Iron gave the community a piece of land for its own church and adjoining cemetery. A small white frame church was completed in 1847, where Domus Bartimaeus was located until recently, OLMC history states.

As the faith community grew, OLMC bought land for a cemetery on Wotton Street in 1858. Under the leadership of Father Dominic Castet, the first resident pastor, a larger church was completed in 1860. It was designed by Jeremiah O’Rourke, the architect who also designed the Cathedral Basilica of the Sacred Heart in Newark, OLMC history states.

The parish school opened in 1863, run by the Dominican Sisters of Caldwell. By the middle of the 19th century, they welcomed Slavic, Italian, and Polish immigrants, along with Germans. In 1906, the Slavic people opened their own parish, Ss. Cyril and Methodius, also in Boonton, parish history states.

In the late 19th century, OLMC established many youth activities, including a drum-and-bugle corps and young men’s club and also formed the first praesidium of the Legion of Mary in New Jersey.

In 1961, the church was falling into disrepair and had to be declared unsafe. A plan to dismantle parts of the structure and rebuild them preserved the original design of the church, but also enabled an expansion of it, the parish history states.

Today, OLMC encourages its faithful with a full schedule of Masses in English and Spanish for the growing Spanish-speaking population. It offers ministries for liturgy, faith formation, such as small sharing groups; and service. These include a food pantry, Busy Hands crocheting ministry, and an outreach to a village in Meno, Haiti.

A parishioner for a year, Maria Morrow and her family learned about how OLMC stayed connected with and offered the Sacraments to its community as much as possible through the pandemic. Father O’Mullane heard confessions outside in a shed turned into a confessional in front of the church. Also the school offered in-person classes as soon as they were feasible, she said.

“I love the families of the parish. The parents — many which have large families — are of like minds,” said Morrow, a college professor and a married mother to seven children, 2 to 16 years old, with five of them attending the school. “The school provides a wonderful environment for the children. It gives them a classical education that is focused on reading, writing, speaking, and thinking critically,” she said.