Holy Name Parish in Beech Grove to celebrate centennial

In this Archive photo, students and a teacher from Holy Name School in Beech Grove pose for a class picture in 1923. (Archive photo)

By Sean Gallagher

For 100 years, Holy Name of Jesus Parish in Beech Grove has been a place where people have come to grow in the faith.

But more than just coming to the parish, they have also stayed there.

Jerry Craney arrived in 1959 as an undergraduate music student to work part time in the parish and its school.

“I had no intention of staying after May,” Craney said. “I was working on my degree at Butler. But then I stayed.”

And did he stay. For nearly half a century, Craney, 75, has been Holy Name’s music director and has taught choral and instrumental music to generations of children at Holy Name School.

“The parish is my life,” he said. “I’m into my second or third generation. Kids that I taught come back with their kids.”

One student who came back to Holy Name is Gina Kuntz Fleming, the school’s principal. Her paternal grandparents were founding members of the parish.

Kuntz Fleming is looking forward to the parish’s centennial celebration that will take place on June 27-29.

“There’s definitely a deep gratitude that I feel, knowing that my faith is as strong as it is because of those seeds that were planted here so many years ago,” Kuntz Fleming said. “I also have such pride in my little, tiny, small part in it. In taking this job, it was about giving back to the place that has given me so much.”

Father Stanley Pondo, Holy Name Parish’s administrator, has Kuntz Fleming’s family and other longtime Holy Name families in mind when he thinks about the upcoming centennial festivities.

“I think the celebration goes beyond just being a parish celebration,” he said. “In some ways, it’s a celebration of our families themselves, and the important part they’ve played in this parish and that the parish has played in the Beech Grove community.”

From 6 p.m. to 11 p.m. on June 27, Holy Name School will sponsor an alumni dinner and dance at Primo Banquet Hall at 2615 E. National Ave. in Indianapolis.

The connection between the city of Beech Grove and the parish will be highlighted on June 28 when Beech Grove Mayor Joe Wright will lead a walk starting at 10:30 a.m. down the town’s Main Street to the front of Holy Name School, where he and Father Pondo will each plant a tree.

At noon on June 28, the parish will have its own picnic within a wider town picnic at Sarah Bolton Park in Beech Grove.

“Beech Grove and Holy Name have had a long and very friendly relationship,” said Father Pondo. “It feels very natural for the parish and the city to be celebrating together.”

The centennial celebrations will culminate with an 11:30 a.m. Mass on June 29 at Holy Name Church with a reception to follow at the parish’s Jerry Craney Performance Center.

Craney’s musical legacy in the parish will be on display during many of the celebrations.

Two bands of alumni that he taught at the school will perform during the dinner and dance. At the Mass, he will direct a brass choir, a youth choir and an adult choir, which will sing a Gloria from a Mozart Mass.

One alumnus who will be present at the Mass didn’t benefit as much from Craney’s talents.

“I was in the seventh grade and I took piano lessons from him,” said Msgr. Joseph F. Schaedel, vicar general.

“I didn’t practice as much as I should have. Finally, at the end of a lesson one day, he said to me, ‘Mr. Schaedel, I think that you and the piano should get a divorce.’ And so that was the end of my musical career. I’ve always teased him, and said he’s the reason my musical career did not reach any heights whatsoever.”

Msgr. Schaedel and several men and women from Holy Name Parish went on instead to priestly or religious vocations.

“Next to my parents and my family, the parish and the school both had a tremendous impact on me and what I decided to do with my life and who I became,” he said. “I always felt that the priests and the nuns that I encountered at Holy Name were happy. They were happy and at peace with what they were doing. And that had a lot to do with my determination of following my path to a religious vocation.”

Holy Name’s centennial celebrations will be more than simply a way of highlighting the past. Father Pondo hopes that it will also focus the parish on evangelization.

“Like any parish community, we would like to be growing,” Father Pondo said. “And the fact that the people in the community see the church and see the community itself and the wonderful things that are going on is always a help to attract people to the parish specifically, but the Church generally.”

Kuntz Fleming thinks the celebrations will demonstrate “passion that we have for our faith and how integral it is that we all continue to work together to continue building and celebrating.

“I’m so, so proud of where Holy Name has been and of the roots that have been planted,” Kuntz Fleming said. “And I’m very excited about our future.”

(To make reservations for Holy Name Parish’s centennial celebrations or for more information, call 317-784-5454, ext. 5, or log on to www.holyname.cc/parish.htm.) †