Five Wounds Portuguese church to mark centennial next weekend
Five Wounds Portuguese National Church, one of San Jose’s most recognizable and majestic buildings, will celebrate its centennial with a series of events next weekend.
“Five Wounds is the heart of the Portuguese community,” said the Rev. António A. Silveira, a native of the Azores and longtime Five Wounds parishioner who became its pastor in 2013. “This is the only national church left in the Bay Area for the Portuguese, but we have parishioners from all ethnicities.”
Little Portugal, the large collection of community centers, stores, coffee shops and restaurants along East Santa Clara Streets that catered to the Portuguese community, grew up around the church. Silveira, who was ordained in 2013 after the death of his wife, Margie, two years earlier, was one of countless people married at the church over the past century. The photogenic Five Wounds shows up on postcards, as the background for quinceañera celebrations and even in an ad touting Southwest Airlines’ service to San Jose.
“Businesses, even nonportuguese businesses, in their radio ads say they are located near Five Wounds Church,” Silveira said.
Miguel Avila, who serves as head of the church’s centennial committee, wrote “A Vestibule to Heaven,” a 2014 coffee table book that details the parish’s history. Monsignor Henrique Ribeiro, along with hundreds of families, petitioned the Archdiocese of San Francisco to create a new church for Santa Clara County’s Portuguese community, which was approved in November 1914. At almost the same time, Ribeiro began plans for a magnificent Portuguese national church.
For the design of Five Wounds, Avila wrote, San Francisco architect John J. Foley was inspired by
the Igreja de Santa Cruz in Braga, Portugal. Both churches have a symmetrical facade, adorned with columns and twin bell towers. The wood for the church was from the Portuguese Pavilion at the Pan-pacific International Exposition in San Francisco in 1915. It was purchased by Ribeiro, dismantled and transported by wagon and car to San Jose via El Camino Real.
Church families, led by benefactor Manuel Teixeira de Freitas, contributed to pay for the construction, often by attending fiestas and bazaars. Thousands of people attended the dedication of the church in East San Jose on July 13, 1919, including Archbishop Edward Hanna of San Francisco, who led a procession of priests, children and adults around the building.
Besides the main church, the grounds of Five Wounds have been home to a rectory, a convent and a school. Of those, only the rectory remains, and in place of the school and convent is Cristo Rey San Jose Jesuit High School. Today, you can take a virtual tour of the church’s 39 stainedglass windows, which were restored in 2015, on its website, www.fivewoundschurch.org.
Next weekend’s events include a High Mass at 5:30 p.m. on Saturday; it will be celebrated by a trio of dignitaries — Bishop Oscar Cantú, retired Bishop Patrick J. Mcgrath, and Bishop João Lavrador, who is bishop of the Azores, the autonomous island region of Portugal. Mass will be followed by a sold-out, ticketed centennial gala. On Sunday, a High Mass will be celebrated at noon, followed by a procession and a reception.
CRUZ STEPS AWAY FROM MARTHA’S KITCHEN >> Edita Cruz is retiring at the end of August after 17 years as executive director of Martha’s Kitchen, the San Jose nonprofit that’s been feeding the hungry since 1981. Cruz’s arrival at the “little soup kitchen” founded by Louise Benson on the grounds of Sacred Heart Church on Willow Street was almost miraculous itself.
Cruz had been working in high-tech since 1974, first at IBM and then at Apple and Hewlett Packard. Like many people in the industry, she jumped to a startup in 1999 and was laid off during the dot-com bust in 2001. That “devastating” event paved her way to Martha’s Kitchen, where she started as an associate executive director under Brother Joseph Nu’uanu, who retired in 2002.
“This has been the most fulfilling position I have ever had,” Cruz said. “And it would not have happened if I had not been laid off.”
During her tenure, a bigger commercial kitchen was installed to expand its serving capacity from 75,000 meals a year to about 500,000.
Cruz will be succeeded by Bill Lee, the retired founder and CEO of San Benito Shutters, but she says she plans to continue helping out.
DETOUR, STAGE RIGHT >> The women of Mission Valley Chorus, a chapter of Sweet Adelines International, were all set for a June 10 performance at Carnegie Hall in New York City.
The Bay Area singers headed out to an afternoon rehearsal for the evening performance, but getting there turned out to be a traffic nightmare after a helicopter crashed into a building a few blocks away from the famed concert venue.
The 53 chorus members — who sing a capella fourpart harmony in barbershop style — were in the lobby of the Grand Hyatt at Grand Central Station waiting for a bus that was stuck in traffic. Worried about missing the rehearsal, director Angela Suraci said, “We need to get to Carnegie,” prompting 13 of the singers to hail taxis. Sarah Clish volunteered to lead an adventurous 10 on the subway.
“You might imagine that even in New York we looked a little odd in our costumes and full stage makeup,” Clish said. “We were laughing and saying who would’ve thought that our way to Carnegie Hall would be on the subway.”
How do you get to Carnegie Hall? Practice, practice, practice, according to the old joke. Or, it turns out, you also can take the 6 Line to 59th and Lexington.
By the way, the bus finally arrived and took the remaining 30 singers to the venue. The performance went off without a hitch, and they left the Big Apple with an unforgettable story. EDDIE OWEN REMEMBERED >> It may have been at the American Cancer Society’s Cattle Baron’s Ball where I first met Eddie Owen, a community benefactor and tireless volunteer who died June 28 at age 73. But it could just have easily been at an event for JW House, Hope Services, Sacred Heart Nativity School, Christmas in the Park or the Italian American Heritage Foundation. All those organizations — and many more — benefited from Eddie’s contribution of time and treasure.
Always at the side of his wife, Helen Marchese Owen, he was a gracious and gregarious host at any event, who loved to tell a good tale about San Jose in the 1960s. He will be remembered at a funeral Mass at 10 a.m. Wednesday at Mission Santa Clara.