National Shrine of St. Jude

The National Shrine of St. Jude was founded by Fr. James Tort, a Claretian missionary priest, in 1929. The Shrine is located within Our Lady of Guadalupe Church in South Chicago. Because St. Jude is the patron saint of hope and impossible causes, Fr. Tort saw him as a potential balm for a congregation living through the national economic crisis of the 1920s. Regular devotions to St. Jude became immensely popular, helping to transform St. Jude from relative obscurity into a national figure. Today, the Shrine receives thousands of prayer petitions to St. Jude each year—and continues to be a source of hope.

Our Lady of Guadalupe Church was the first Mexican parish in Chicago. Its congregation was predominantly laborers who immigrated from Mexico during the 1910s to work in the city’s steel mills. Claretian Missionaries were given charge of the parish by Chicago’s Cardinal George Mundelein in 1924. The original church was a former army barracks that was transported from Michigan to Chicago in 1923. Located at 9024 S. Mackinaw Ave, the barracks served as Our Lady of Guadalupe Church until 1928 when the current building was built on the corner of 91st and Brandon.