St. Stanislaus Polish Catholic Church — Attraction in St. Louis

This church holds my first memory as a child. My parents and nearly everyone in my extended family have been married here. The Wilga tradition and name would still be alive and thriving here if not for sinful greed. Fall festivals, Polish celebrations, wedding showers, baby showers, the most peaceful of midnight mass' on Christmas Eve....in which I swear it snowed every year and I can still hear the dress shoes my mother made me wear crunching in the snow along the sidewalk to the steps of the front door, where inside I would find my grandparents, aunt's, uncle's, cousins, my aunt and uncle's cousins and their children, my grandparent's siblings and heir extended families, and the intense presence of Jesus. My dad was actually named "Vincent", in honor of Father. Father Vince...may he be resting in eternal peace with his savior...he performed mass in Polish (not all, but often) and I didn't understand one word, but I always watched my grandparents and my Aunt always recite prayers and sing Psalms right along with him on Polish, as if Engilsh were the foreign language to them. These moments are part of who I am. The greatest and most fulfilling moment of my life was here. A day that, I swear, I remember every single minute of. My wedding day. A cool, crisp, fall morning in late October 2002. It was just as I had dreamed of after having attended family weddings there my entire life. No words can describe the honor I felt to fulfill my final sacrament... committing myself and promising God that I would honor my best friend until my last breath. The last time I walked out the doors and down the front steps to leave St. Stan's...it was with my new husband holding my hand. I was beyond blessed that day in the church that had been a second home to me my entire life. A piece of my heart will always be there, as I will never forget the greatest moment in my life that happened right inside those doors, in God's house that he shared with us. Sadly, I was the last one in my family to be married here before the archdiocese came in and took over and put a halt on EVERYTHING....they took away our home, our memories, our reason, our future, and tradition. I'm not positive, but it's even a possibility that I may have been the very last person to have been married at St. Stanislaus. My younger cousins and brother, I'm sure, were devastated to learn that this tradition in our family was over and that they would someday have to accept that their wedding day would never be possible here. Our family was built on the foundation of this historical church. Anyone that has ever been to a mass or ceremony or celebrate here will agree, there is NO house of God like this one and there never will be again. ...

I gave this church 1 star because I had to give a rating to post this review. If I could give 0 stars after my news I would happily. Tonight I got some very upsetting news that has upset me about St Stanislaus yet again. My wife and I went to this church between 2011-2012 and even had our church wedding here. To have our church wedding here I had to convert to become catholic. I went to 9 months of classes to get confirmed. We have since moved to Texas and started a family. We went to a new church here and tried to register with the new church. We gave them our wedding certificate and my baptism and confirmation certificate only for them to come back later and tell us my documents are invalid as they are not signed by a bishop. This mean my sons emergency baptism is invalid, we cannot at this time get my daughter baptized, our wedding in this church is invalid, also my children cannot go to a catholic church. We made sure to ask Janis if the course and the certificates would be recognized elsewhere and were reassured more then once they would be. Way to go St Stans now I have to go through this 9 month class again at a real church and possibly get married again. For anyone looking at taking this class or getting married at this church I warn you to look elsewhere if you want it to be recognized outside this church. For...

St. Stanislaus is a church built in the late 1800s for the Polish community in this area. We met Jerry, who plays the organ here, and he gave us an extensive history lesson about the area and the parish. The interior design is wonderful, even after a "refurbishment" in the 1980s where original wood and artwork got painted over to "modernize" the place (we all lamented this decision). Jerry told us the story of the Lady of Czestochowa, from where they received one of the remaining paintings.

Jerry said that this church welcomes those of all faiths. We are from Orlando, so the kindness Jerry showed us was not to try to get us to join this church. But he did say they are working on a couple of fundraising projects, one for the stained glass windows to be cleaned and refreshed, and another to upgrade the light fixtures. If you are a believer visiting from out of town, or you live in the area and are looking for a church that prints their bulletin in English, Polish, y español, or you want to see a historic and beautiful St. Louis church, this place is...