Celebrating 50 years of faith

Members of Elk Grove's Lutheran Church of the Holy Spirit have had much to celebrate in recent months.

Late last summer, after more than four years without a pastor, they welcomed the Rev. Tim Manwell to the church as its sixth pastor. Then, in December they began a yearlong celebration of the congregation's 50th anniversary, which will culminate in November.

Formerly pastor of a Lutheran church in Butler, Pa., in the western part of the state, Manwell said that while he was very impressed with the church and its members, he was also attracted to the position because of a key portion of the 50-year history that its members are proudly celebrating this year.

It was founded by one of the best-known and most respected American Lutheran theologians of today -- Martin E. Marty, a divinity professor at the University of Chicago. Marty, now 80, has authored or co-authored more than 100 books and is frequently interviewed on television, so Manwell was thrilled by the opportunity to serve at the church Marty had founded.

The story of the Lutheran Church of the Holy Spirit's founding is unlike most. After getting his graduate degree from the University of Chicago in 1955, Marty was commissioned by the English District of the Lutheran Church's Missouri Synod to be a missionary-at-large in the Northwest suburbs. He was told to gather enough people -- somewhere -- to start a church.

Marty immediately set off and visited homes throughout the region without much luck until he read a Paddock Publications story in 1956 about a new "ideal suburb" housing development about to be built by the Centex Corp. of Texas in Elk Grove Township.

Described as "a completely pre-planned, balanced community of homes, industry and commerce, churches, hospitals … schools and libraries," the development sounded perfect to Marty. So he went to work to make sure that his church was the first one approved in the new town.

After much back and forth and promises of three different plots of land by Centex, ground 1,000 feet east of Arlington Heights Road on Elk Grove Boulevard was finally broken for the church in early December 1958.

Charles Edward Stade of Park Ridge was chosen as the architect for the church. Stade is best known for designing the Chapel of the Resurrection and many other buildings on the campus of Valparaiso University.

By the time ground was finally broken, the 160 charter members of the congregation had been meeting in Marty's parsonage and holding services at Rupley School for almost a year. But it would be more than another year before members could finally hold Sunday services in the new church. It was dedicated in June 1960.

And it was immediately too small to meet the growing congregation's needs. So Stade was hired to draw an education wing to be added to the church. Th wing was dedicated in January 1963.

Soon after this addition was complete, Marty took his leave of Elk Grove to return to the University of Chicago as a professor, where he would become a name synonymous with American Lutheranism.

But he never lost touch with the congregation he founded in his youth. In fact, according to Manwell, Marty plans to return in November to address the members and help them celebrate their 50th anniversary.

In the years that followed Marty's departure, the Lutheran Church of the Holy Spirit grew and prospered, mirroring the growth of Elk Grove Village.

Betty Jarosch remembers those days well. She and her late husband, Herbert, were charter members.

"We and our three children at the time moved into our house in September 1957. We moved out to Elk Grove to open a bakery because I didn't want to live above a bakery somewhere in the city," she recalled.

"Dr. Marty stopped by to see us soon after we moved in. My husband was a Lutheran but I had been a Congregationalist. But since I had had some training in Lutheranism, Dr. Marty agreed to take me and we both became charter members," Jarosch continued.

She recalled the Lutheran Church of the Holy Spirit as a great place to meet other young families in those early years.

"There were so many kids out here back then," she recalled. "All of the services in the early years were always packed and the Confirmation classes were huge."

All four Jarosch children went to Sunday school and were confirmed in the church. For 11 years, Jarosch even led the Junior Choir with her daughter as accompanist for a few of those years.

"At one time we had three Sunday morning services in order to accommodate everyone and had 400 to 500 children enrolled in our Sunday school," recalled Gert Stoffregen, another longtime member and chairman of the anniversary committee.

The church hit the summit of its membership in 1972 or 1973, and then the aging of the community at large began chipping away at membership as the church's population grew older and children moved away, she explained.

Today the church regularly attracts slightly more than 100 worshippers to services Sunday morning and Thursday evening each week, according to Manwell.

But the church has an active music program and a popular interdenominational program called the Stephen Ministry to care for community members in crisis situations.

It is also well-known for its preschool, which will reopen in the fall after a one-year hiatus, renamed as the Grace International Preschool at Holy Spirit. The church also rents its facilities every Sunday afternoon to the Gyu Ja Shee Korean Covenant Church congregation so that it has a place to hold services.

The Living Nativity held each December is also a well-known outreach for the congregation.

And this anniversary year, Stoffregen's committee has planned an activity for each month ranging from a Valentine dinner and renewal of marriage vows in February to a High Tea in May and an Oktoberfest in October.

It will all culminate on Nov. 30 when Marty speaks at the morning service, followed by a celebratory luncheon.

Upcoming events

More information can be found by contacting the church at (847) 437-5897 or through www.eglchs.org.

April: Certificates presented to village and local school districts; staff and volunteer recognition

May: High Tea

June: Village parade, garden walk

July: Outdoor service and parish picnic

August: Special Vespers Service

September: Parish musical

October: Oktoberfest

November: Bishop David Stechholz of the Missouri Synod's English District will preach one Sunday; founding pastor Martin E. Marty will speak, with luncheon to follow on Nov. 30