September 17, 2025 // Diocese

St. Thérèse, Little Flower Honors Its Founding Father

Abby Kyle

I almost spit out my iced latte while listening to the Hallow app as I was driving to work at St. Thérèse, Little Flower Parish in March of 2024. I had turned on the app’s Lenten Series, “The Little Way,” co-produced by Hallow and Saints Alive. After listening to previous episodes from Saints Alive on the life of Venerable Patrick Peyton, I was excited to listen to their Hallow-exclusive episode on a relatively unknown story from the early days of his life as a Holy Cross seminarian.

As I continued to listen, parts of the story sounded so familiar – a loose horse from Moreau Seminary led two seminarians, Pat Peyton and Jack Haley, on a chase where they discovered a destitute neighborhood in South Bend that was unkindly referred to as “Dogpatch,” full of predominantly Catholics who didn’t attend Mass out of feelings of unworthiness to enter the basilica (the nearest church). Out of great apostolic zeal, these two seminarians knocked on every single door, got to know everyone from the neighborhood, and seeing their need for God, and by the inspiration of soon-to-be Father Patrick Peyton, the Congregation of Holy Cross began to build a parish to serve this poor community.

As I listened, I thought: “That sounds so similar to Little Flower’s founding. … What are the odds that this happened twice?” At the end of the episode, the narrator concluded: “And they named the parish Little Flower, after St. Thérèse of Lisieux.”

The joy and excitement that filled my heart spilled over and I could hardly wait to get to the office, where I serve as  director of evangelization at St. Thérèse, Little Flower Parish in South Bend! I ran around the office telling everyone to stop what they were doing and listen – “Hallow just released a story about the founding of our parish!”

This began a wildfire of beautiful coincidences and moments of divine providence! Under the leadership of our pastor, Father Julius Okojie, it seemed so evident that we needed to acknowledge this part of our history that had been forgotten: A young Irish seminarian had the fire to begin a small parish for the poor in South Bend. That same man, with the same fire, became known around the world as the Rosary Priest as he spread his now well-known message of “the family that prays together stays together” in Rosary rallies, on the radio, and on television – in America and around the world! 

The plan began simply, as we decided to dedicate and name our parish center the Venerable Patrick Peyton Center. But the divine providence didn’t end there. I was contacted by Craig Dyke at Holy Cross Family Ministries (founded by Father Peyton) about their Rosary Rally at Notre Dame, which was held on Sunday, September 7. The Holy Spirit’s inspiration struck again! What better weekend to dedicate our parish center than the same weekend of the Rosary Rally? Dyke was so excited by this prospect that he brought along his whole team, including the president of Holy Cross Family Ministries, Father Fred Jenga, and the vice-postulator for Father Peyton’s canonization cause, Father David Marcham. They joined the parish for Mass and hosted a Q&A at our celebration potluck on Saturday, September 6. Our parish’s Filipino community had already planned to celebrate Our Lady of Peñafrancia that same weekend, and they joyfully joined our celebration. (In another God moment, Father Peyton’s largest and final Rosary Rally was held in the Philippines.)

We concluded the night by watching the documentary of Father Peyton’s life, “Pray: The Film,” and ended the next day with the Rosary Rally at Notre Dame. The keynote speaker at the rally was Alex Jones, co-founder of the Hallow app. Don’t tell me God doesn’t “make all things work for good for those who love Him!” That verse, from Romans 8:28, isn’t just a consolation for the suffering. That verse is meant to awaken hope, expectation, and bold faith that our powerful God wants to make big moves to win hearts and families back to Himself. He shows up in big ways for those who expect big things of Him. Father Patrick Peyton is a testament to that – as evidenced by his life and clearly by his work behind the scenes for St. Thérèse, Little Flower Parish on this special weekend.

Venerable Patrick Peyton, pray for us!