About Us

The Shrine of St. Jude is a ministry offering hope to the hopeless and despairing since 1929. Staffed by the Order of Preachers, perhaps better known as Dominican Friars, the Shrine began through the personal devotion of its founder Fr. William Marchant O.P. who was pastor of St. Pius V Parish in the Pilsen neighborhood of Chicago, Illinois. The Shrine has thereafter resided within St. Pius V Parish and ministered first to Irish immigrants, then immigrants of Eastern Europe (Poles, Bohemians, Slovenians, Czechs, Slavs, and Hungarians), and most recently Mexican immigrants. Over the years since its foundation, the Shrine has witnessed national economic highs and lows, the foundation of a new Dominican Province in the Midwest, reception of the largest relic of an Apostle of Jesus Christ outside of Rome, countless millions of letters requesting prayers, and unknown thousands of faithful pilgrim visits.