Our Lady of Vilna Parish 
celebrates 100 year anniversary

By Tanya Connor | The Catholic Free Press

WORCESTER – Lithuanians whose ancestors founded Our Lady of Vilna Parish joined the Vietnamese community now worshipping there in celebrating the parish’s 100th anniversary Sunday.

“What do the Lithuanians have to do with the Vietnamese?” Bishop McManus asked at the Mass. “The commonality between these two great countries is the gift of faith,” for which many of their forebears suffered. “The blood of the martyrs is the seed of the Church,” the bishop said, and spoke of sharing faith with one’s family.

In his homily, Father Peter Tam M. Bui, pastor, said the immigrants who built Our Lady of Vilna didn’t have money, but had faith and love of God.  

The late Auxiliary Bishop George E. Rueger, who facilitated the Vietnamese community’s move to the parish, had said many people look up to them, Father Bui recalled, and spoke being light for the next generation.  

Sister Ruth Dauginikas, of the Poor Sisters of Jesus Crucified and the Sorrowful Mother in Brockton, who grew up at Our Lady of Vilna, taught people at Mass Sunday to say “Thank you” in Lithuanian.  

“I’m happy to be here and I’m happy to share with you this wonderful occasion,” she said.
Another former parishioner, Joan (Adamaitis) Agerholm, who came for the occasion from Virginia with her husband, spoke in Vietnamese at the reception, saying, “It was an honor to be here to celebrate this anniversary with you.” (Her Vietnamese hairdresser had helped her with the pronunciation.)

Fifty years ago she’d been coached by her mother, who also grew up at Our Lady of Vilna, to speak in Lithuanian for the parish’s 50th anniversary, she said.  

“I didn’t like Lithuanian, because we were in America and I wanted us to be American,” she said. Now she says, “You need to keep up the language and culture,” whatever it is.  

“I am grateful that there was a Vietnamese congregation that they could transfer this church to, to reinvigorate it,” she said. “It was a win-win for both sides.”

Janis (Pigaga) Tebo, of Our Lady of the Angels Parish, said her grandparents Ignus and Eva Pigaga, immigrants from Lithuania, were among Our Lady of Vilna’s founders.

“They were proud of the church,” she said. “They were proud to be Lithuanians. ... It was a very tight-knit community.” Attending the anniversary celebration with her husband, Bruce, and cousin Denise Pigaga, “we could feel our grandparents’ spirit,” Mrs. Tebo said.  

Matthew Glavickas, brought up at Our Lady of Vilna and now a member of Immaculate Conception Parish, said his grandfather Juozas W. Glavickas helped found and fund Our Lady of Vilna.

Histories in the parish’s 50th anniversary booklet and The Catholic Free Press articles tell the following story, in which Juozas Glavickas was a key player.

Finding it a long walk to St. Casimir’s, a Lithuanian parish, in 1912 Lithuanians in south Worcester called for a new parish and bought a lot around 1915.  

St. Casimir’s was not completed, and Bishop Thomas D. Beaven of Springfield asked them to wait and work with St. Casimir’s pastor, who favored a plot farther away from his church. In 1916 the first plot was sold, and the money saved for a new spot.

Bishop Beaven’s successor, Bishop Thomas M. O’Leary, also raised concerns about the Lithuanians’ ability to fund another church.

The 50th anniversary booklet calls Juozas Glavickas organizer, elected president in 1914, a delegate in contact with both bishops.

 The delegates wrote to Bishop O’Leary repeatedly, with “negative” results. Their committee petitioned Pope Pius XI and received a reply on the back of their plea; the pope approved of the founding of a new parish.

Bishop O’Leary invited the delegates to meet with him in 1922, and established the new parish on May 16, 1925. He appointed Father Julius Caplikas pastor. The new community rented Sacred Heart Parish’s hall and the first Mass was celebrated on May 24, 1925.  
Bishop O’Leary blessed the cornerstone of the new church on July 4, 1926.  On Oct. 24, 1926, the first Mass was celebrated there.

In 1929 Father Caplikas died and Father C. A. Vasys became pastor. Father Michael F. Tamulevicius succeeded him in 1968 and died in 1969. Father Alphonse Volungis, who was born in the parish, succeeded him.

Father Volungis was pastor in December 2001 when the Vietnamese community, outgrowing space at St. John Parish, came to Our Lady of Vilna, which had few parishioners left. He retired in 2002 and Father Phuong Van Nguyen, who was already ministering to the Vietnamese, succeeded him. Father Nguyen drowned on Good Friday 2004. Father Peter Tam M. Bui succeeded him, and continued church renovations.

Parishioner Michelle Nguyen said it took much time and money to maintain the church, and volunteers helped. She said the Vietnamese appreciate the Lithuanians starting the parish, not suspecting their countrymen would leave. She hopes the Vietnamese will remain; they want the new generation to continue it.  

“We still have a culture” and youth are still involved, she said.

Indeed, the Vietnamese Eucharistic Youth did lion and flower dances for the anniversary.  
Patricia Krzywicki-Bryant, from the Legion of Mary at Annunciation Parish in Gardner, which affiliates with the Legion of Mary at Our Lady of Vilna, praised the Vietnamese youth she met Sunday. You ask a question and “they look you in the eye and they talk to you,” she said.  
Speaking through a translator, Muon Dinh said she wants more people to come; she wants the parish to last a long time.

Thuy Pham, also speaking through a translator, said she wanted to thank God for giving them a church like this to which new immigrants can come.