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The
history of St. Victor’s Church, West Hollywood’s oldest
institution, reflects the growth of the Los Angeles region, the
character of the Westside, the importance of the entertainment industry
to the region and the impact of changing demographics and social
changes on the Church as a whole.
Early History of the Hollywood Area
Mass was first celebrated in the Hollywood area in January 1770,
when Governor Gaspar de Portolá’s expeditionary force
reached the Cahuenga Pass. Yet the area, wild and distant from the
center of Los Angeles served by the famous Plaza Church, remained
a mission territory until 1903, when a group of Hollywood residents
asked Bishop George Montgomery for a parish to serve the area, then
a community of ranchers and entrepreneurs numbering some 700 people.
Indeed, that same year, the residents of Hollywood voted to incorporate
as a city, an independent status that was to last only until 1909,
when Hollywood was annexed to the City of Los Angeles.
Bishop Conaty kept the promise made by Bishop Montgomery to the
residents of Hollywood, and the cornerstone of the old Blessed Sacrament
Church was laid on July 4, 1904. The church was completed in September
of that year.
A Church for Sherman
Far to the west of the new church, in a tiny settlement of workers
employed at the Doheny oil wells (at the present day location of
Third and Melrose) and the Los Angeles Pacific Railway, a prominent
member of the new Blessed Sacrament parish lived in a palatial house
in the hills. Victor Ponet was a native of Belgium who immigrated
to San Francisco in 1867. Shortly thereafter he had moved to this
small community, then called Sherman, where he ensconced himself
on a 350-acre ranch. The town was named was named for Moses Sherman,
a Catholic and native of Vermont who had built a large railway repair
yard in the area.
A few months before the cornerstone was laid for Blessed Sacrament
Church, Mr. Ponet went to Bishop Conaty and offered to build a small
church in Sherman so that the workers, unable to journey to Blessed
Sacrament, would have a place to attend Mass. The bishop accepted
Ponet’s generous offer, and told him that there would be no
full-time priest assigned for some time, but that a priest from
Blessed Sacrament could make the trek.
The Boston architectural firm of Maginnis, Walshe and Sullivan designed
a quaint English-style wooden church with a spire that would be
visible for miles around. Ground was broken for the church on April
25, 1905, and the dedication was on December 5, 1906. Fr. Joseph
Glass, a Vincentian priest who would later become bishop of Salt
Lake City, celebrated the dedication Mass, with Bishop Conaty preaching
the homily on the theme: “For other foundations no man can
lay, but that which is laid in Jesus Christ.” The proud Mr.
Ponet, whose patron was also the patron of the new church (at the
time the only church in the country dedicated to St. Victor), hosted
a festive banquet at his ranch, where guests could look out on the
impressive new church.
The Tidings, the diocesan newspaper, reported that “In
all of California there is no more romantic church site; its gilded
cross on the hill, a beacon to the Western sea; its sweetly toned
bell calling to prayer the lovely valley before it. Saint Victor’s
stands the last link in the chain from Mount San Bernardino to the
Pacific.”
Growth Continues
For nearly 20 years, the little church in Sherman dedicated to the
first African pope was served by priests from Blessed Sacrament
parish; in 1914 it was entrusted to the Jesuits by Bishop Conaty.
They continued the excellent pioneering work begun in the area by
Fr. Daniel Murphy, the first pastor of Blessed Sacrament. In 1922,
Bishop John J. Cantwell established St. Ambrose parish between Blessed
Sacrament and St. Victor’s, and the pastor there was assigned
responsibility for the little church until the first resident pastor,
Fr. Vincent Shepherd, was assigned to the newly established St.
Victor’s Parish in September of 1925. The need for parishes
in the area was a result of the westward expansion of the city of
Los Angeles and the growing importance of the motion picture industry
in Hollywood. Around this time, Sherman began to be called West
Hollywood.
When Fr. Shepherd was transferred to St. John’s Church in San
Diego in 1929, Bishop Cantwell turned to his private secretary,
Fr. John J. Devlin, to serve as pastor of St. Victor’s. Fr.
Devlin was born in Ireland and graduated from All Hallows College,
where he was ordained in 1922 for what was then the Diocese of Monterey-Los
Angeles. Amazingly, he remained pastor of St. Victor’s until
his retirement in 1976.
In June of 1930, Mother Mary Frances, C.S.J., agreed to send three
Sisters of St. Joseph of Orange to serve as teachers at a new parish
school. Volunteers converted the parish hall into a school over
the summer. In 1937, a convent was built, 1n 1941 a new rectory
was built and in 1949 a new school.
The Legion of Decency
In 1933, the Catholic bishops of the United States established a
committee to work with the motion picture industry on maintaining
certain standards for what was depicted in films. Fr. Devlin accompanied
Bishop Cantwell to meetings which resulted in the formation of the
Legion of Decency, of which Fr. Devlin was named diocesan director,
a post which made him the principal liaison of the Catholic Church
in America to the motion picture industry for many years.
The Legion of Decency was at first a welcome solution for the motion
picture industry, then under violent attack by various communities
in the United States for perceived laxness of standards in depicting
various situations on film. By working closely with the Hayes Commission
and the Legion of Decency, the motion picture industry was able
to avoid governmental interference by self-regulation, and the prominence
of the Catholic Church in working with the movie studios gave rise
to numerous accusations of laxity by prominent Protestant clergy,
who wanted a more confrontational stance with the studios than the
Catholic Church, specifically Fr. Devlin and Bishop Cantwell, preferred.
Many complex negotiations concerning what could and could not get
by the Legion and the Hayes Commission were undertaken in St. Victor’s
rectory.
While today the idea of the Legion of Decency may seem an outdated
and severe approach (the name itself seems to project a certain
attitude), it actually helped the film industry avoid more stringent
legislative controls and led to the modern-day system of movie ratings.
Fr. Devlin was rewarded for his efforts with elevation to the rank
of Monsignor in 1947.
A New Church, a New City, a New World
In 1957, a drive was begun to raise money for the construction of
a new church to replace the original one, which after 50 years was
showing signs of wear and was rapidly being outgrown by the parish.
The goal of $50,000 was realized quickly, and on July 27, 1959,
the vigil of the feast of St. Victor, the last Mass was celebrated
in the old church. In June of 1960, the first Mass was offered in
the new church, and the main altar was consecrated in February of
1961.
After some 48 years as pastor, Msgr. Devlin was succeeded as pastor
by Fr. John Gutting. Shortly thereafter, on April 6, 1977, Msgr.
Devlin died, uncomfortable with the changes in society and the liturgy
of the Church. Fr. Gutting realized that for some time, there had
not been a need for a school in the parish; even in the boom years
of the ‘50s and ‘60s, when schools were being opened as
quickly as they could be built by Cardinal McIntyre, St. Victor’s
School was filled largely with students bused in from Valley parishes,
where the schools were bursting with Baby Boom children. The school
was closed.
And West Hollywood had changed. The small cottages and ranch houses
were disappearing, replaced by apartment buildings. There were no
more oil wells or railroad yards, and very few “traditional”
families as members of the gay community especially discovered unincorporated
West Hollywood as a refuge from the harassment and unnecessary raids
that were then the common practice of the Los Angeles Police Department.
In 1977, Msgr. George J. Parnassus was appointed administrator and
then pastor of St. Victor’s, where he had been in residence
from 1974 through 1976 while an instructor at Mount Saint Mary’s
College. Due to the tensions of the times, the presence of various
factions in the parish as well as a small group opposed to the changes
of the Second Vatican Council who availed themselves of the retired
Msgr. Devlin’s preference for the old rite, the parish had
shrunk considerably. Mass attendance on any given weekend was about
600 people, less than the 700 Catholics registered in the parish
in 1936.
With the able assistance of Fr. Welton Skiffington, S.J., Msgr.
Parnassus set to work healing the factions and making the parish
more accessible to the community the parish was there to serve.
Although he jokingly claims among his greatest achievements sprinklers
in the front of the church and a new speed bump in the driveway,
it was under Msgr. Parnassus that extensive redecoration of the
church was undertaken which is evident by anyone who sees a picture
of the original 1960 interior. By maintaining a careful attention
to quality in music and liturgy, St. Victor’s has become a
popular and accessible part of the new West Hollywood, with a welcoming
spirit that now attracts more than 2,600 people every weekend.
Without a doubt, the greatest disaster to befall the parish has
been the AIDS epidemic. There is not a street in West Hollywood
where Msgr. Parnassus has not known someone affected by the epidemic,
and there are certainly few people in West Hollywood who have not
attended at least one funeral at St. Victor’s. St. Victor’s
parish was one of the first parishes in the Archdiocese to host
regular AIDS Masses, which take place each year on Palm Sunday and
on the Sunday closest to the Feast of the Triumph of the Cross (September
14). Hundreds of people have attended these Masses and been anointed,
largely as a result of St. Victor’s outreach to the surrounding
gay and lesbian community. Many stay to call St. Victor’s their
parish.
On Palm Sunday, March 27, 1994, Bishop Stephen Blaire, auxiliary
bishop of Los Angeles, dedicated the new Lady Chapel at St. Victor’s
as a memorial to those lost to HIV and AIDS. The chapel has become
a place where people from all over the area—Catholic and non-Catholic,
gay and straight—come to remember their loved ones. More than
1500 names are inscribed in the Book of Remembrance kept in the
chapel.
St. Victor’s was here before there was a West Hollywood, when
a wealthy businessman wanted to build a church so that a small community
of Mexican workers would have a place to attend Mass. Built by an
immigrant for immigrants, named for an African pope and filled with
gay and straight Catholics of every race who worship together in
harmony, St. Victor’s parish continues to proclaim the Gospel
to West Hollywood and Los Angeles and to serve the community with
faith, hope and love.
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