St Mary Of The Lake Catholic Church

I’ve been a parishioner here for just over a year and this is by far the most spiritually satisfying church I’ve ever been a part of. Below you can find an almost random collection of videos and photos I’ve taken throughout the year with different spiritual events thrown in. I’ve been to many different denominational churches, mosques, and Baha’i temples in my life in search of God. I was raised Catholic early in life, but went in deep search of different ideas and spiritualities in my life. Eventually, I can back to Catholicism, in full force, in no small part because of this parish. It is a welcoming place with very friendly parishioners, many of whom have become my friends. The community is of so many different ages, races, and backgrounds, it’s cool seeing the church be so intertwined. The homily’s (sermons) are never long enough, in my opinion, but always resonate on such a unique level with me. As you can see in one of the videos one of our pastors really interacts with us and preaches with us, not to us - (the video was cut off but he had us do a little Q&A and get up to look at part of the room to explain a point about preaching the gospel outside the church). It makes me think about the topic at hand and feel at home. Besides the church having many extra activities, like a young peoples club, Bible study, etc… they most importantly help others in need. If you want to join, we feed about 100 homeless people every Wednesday with a cookout. Afterwards we give premade food bags for them, which can be found in one or two of the photos I posted. We also give out huge amounts of clothing in the winter, and the church doesn’t just have a sign outside that reads we should help refugees, but we actively house, feed, and aid many, I see and participate firsthand and it’s incredible. I feel like there’s a real impact being made, often our pastor is leading efforts in the city to help those in need, especially on the topic of refugees in chicago. Often when I went to other places of worship, including other Catholic Churches, i did not find that they were practicing what they were preaching. There usually wasn’t a lot of work done to directly aid the community outside of prayer. That is definitely not the case here. All in all, the church has a thriving Spanish and English speaking community with packed masses, a legitimate impact on the community and greater area that you can help with, fantastic spiritual guidance, and many events that make me feel right at home. I hope this helped.

Lovely community of people, excellent priests. One thing I will say is just be aware that they don't have air or good airflow so it does get really hot, I'd suggest bringing a fan and dressing in clothes that are good for heat. They have a lot of different activities, great Mass time options and it's absolutely beautiful. Really great spot

I am a "cradle Catholic", and have been a parishioner of St. Mary of the Lake for 30 years. In all that time, I have never experienced a Mass as beautiful as the 8:30 Easter celebration. The floral arrangements were glorious . The instrumental and vocal music was heavenly. Fr. Vince's sermon touched on the true meaning of our faith. His joy at seeing all the "little ones" in attendance was infectious. Congratulations and blessings to all involved in producing this most important and beautiful celebration of our faith. JKN