“The parish was formed in 1922, and there was nothing but farmland and a few houses here and there.”

Toni Wagner is the trustee secretary of St. Catherine’s Catholic Church in Milwaukee and volunteered for the Doors Open Milwaukee event. She has been a member of the parish for decades, and her children attended St. Catherine’s school. She has lived in the surrounding neighborhood of Sherman Park for more than 45 years.

Juan Escutia: How long have you been active in this church?

Toni Wagner: I’ve been a member of this parish since 1971, for over 50 years. Always came to this Church. The history of this parish is it was formed in 1922, and there was nothing but farmland and a few houses here and there in 1922. The people who decided to form this parish through the Archdiocese of Milwaukee first built barracks so that they had someplace to stay while they built the school next door. The school was dedicated in 1924 and it has had a class graduating since 1924 and every single year since. We’re still active now and while that school was being built, they said mass and had their services in the little barracks they had built. After that they built a place for the teachers, which was the nuns, which was our convent. That place was dedicated in 1929. Then in 1936 they built a place for the priests. The church you just looked at was not finished and dedicated until 1950, so up until then they worshiped in a very small space in the basement of the school. But we’ve been here since 1922.

Juan Escutia: Have there been any recent additions or renovations to the space since 1950?

Toni Wagner: Small. Along the way. Because of liturgical changes in the Catholic Church in the early 70’s we took down the communion rail. We turned the alter the other way because Vatican 2 happened within the Catholic Church, so we needed to adapt our church to that. Renovations to the actual church itself, no. It’s pretty close to its original form.

Juan Escutia: Since you’ve been a member of this community for so long, have you noticed any changes in terms of people around my age coming out to church?

Toni Wagner: The thing is the neighborhood has changed drastically. When I first moved in and it was all young families; all of us had children going to St. Catherine’s in its heyday. We probably had 800 students there. Now we have 155 and all the students who are attending St. Catherine’s are neighborhood children, none of them are parishioners. Young people are not in this neighborhood any longer. We’re trying to get young people to join us, but it just hasn’t been successful.

Juan Escutia: So then how was the first day of Doors Open Milwaukee, did the church attract a nice crowd for the event?

Toni Wagner: It was really good! We had 111 people show up. They came in through the doors from 10 am – 5 pm. Many people who walk through the doors of our church go, “wow!” when they walk in. The guests look at those windows, the rank of 12 windows. The great window facing north is comprised of seven more beautiful windows. I mean there’s a lot to see in the church and we had tour guides stationed at each section to give you an in-depth of what you were looking at and how this church was built. It started to be built in 1948 and actually dedicated in 1950, so we’ve been worshiping in that space since 1950.

Juan Escutia: I know your busy so let me just circle back and ask you one more question, you mentioned the neighborhood has changed and that it has affected how many people come to the church. What do you foresee the future holding for the church and neighborhood?

Toni Wagner: The church is here to serve the neighborhood. If you spend a little time looking at some of our information tables in the back of the actual church, you’ll find out we have a food pantry. In fact, yesterday while the Doors Open was going on we were serving food from our food pantry. People come and get bags of food for their families. We have a St. Vincent DePaul which is servicing the people in need within the community of Milwaukee, giving them things they might need. We have other ministries that are slipping me right now, but we have quite a few ministries that reach out into the public and they call them Ministers of the Word Next Door. They talk to people about coming to our church, so we do have a lot of outreach into the community. We’ve been members of Sherman Park community association since its inception. We’re here. We’re part of bid. We’re part of the business improvement district on center street. We just make ourselves visible and part of the community.