Our History - St. Nicholas of Tolentine Parish
Jamaica, New York
The roots of St. Nicholas of Tolentine Parish reach back to the earliest days of the Catholic Church in Queens. The Catholic population of Jamaica began to grow significantly after the arrival of the railroad in 1836, when Irish laborers joined the Irish farmworkers already living in the area. Because Catholic churches were still scarce on Long Island, priests often traveled considerable distances to care for scattered communities. In 1839, Father Nicholas O’Donnell, O.S.A., was appointed pastor of St. Paul’s Church in Brooklyn, with his kinsman, Father James O’Donnell, O.S.A., serving as his assistant. While Father Nicholas attended to the parish in Brooklyn, Father James cared for missions in Flatbush, Williamsburg, Sag Harbor, and Jamaica.
Father James O’Donnell soon erected a small frame church for the Jamaica mission. Dedicated to St. Monica, the mother of St. Augustine, it was blessed by Bishop John Dubois of New York on June 7, 1840. Father O’Donnell left Jamaica in 1844, nine years before the Diocese of Brooklyn was established in 1853. With his departure, the Augustinians’ early missionary work in what would become the Diocese of Brooklyn came to an end. More than seventy years would pass before the Order returned to serve the Catholics of Jamaica.
The Founding of the Parish
On August 28, 1916, the Feast of St. Augustine, Bishop Charles E. McDonnell, the second Bishop of Brooklyn, informed the Augustinian provincial that the diocesan consultors had approved a new Augustinian foundation in Queens. The new parish was entrusted with the territory between Jamaica and Flushing that included the Parental Home, later the site of Queens College, and the Queensboro Hospital for Communicable Diseases, which became part of the present Queens Hospital Center. The parish was placed under the patronage of St. Nicholas of Tolentine, the first canonized saint of the Augustinian Order.
Father John F. Kennedy, O.S.A., was appointed the first rector on November 1, 1916. Before a rectory could be built, he resided for a time at St. Michael’s Rectory in Flushing as the guest of Monsignor Eugene J. Donnelly and later with Father John M. Scheffel at Presentation of the Blessed Virgin Mary Church in Jamaica. On January 8, 1917, approximately nine acres of land at Flushing Avenue, now Parsons Boulevard, and Union Turnpike were transferred to the Augustinian Society of New York. Despite the difficulties created by the First World War, construction proceeded, and the first Mass in the new church was celebrated on October 14, 1917. The original church seated 272 people and served 16 families, principally of Irish and German heritage. Although the Augustinians began organizing the parish in 1916, the Diocese of Brooklyn officially lists 1917 as the year of its foundation. The Augustinians confirm the establishment of the foundation in 1916, while the Diocese of Brooklyn’s historical directory records the parish as founded in 1917.
The young parish grew rapidly. In May 1918, 22 children received their First Holy Communion in the parish’s first celebration of the sacrament. The following year, Bishop Salvatore Walleser confirmed 93 people. To provide Catholic education for the growing number of families, St. Nicholas of Tolentine Parish School opened in 1929 under the direction of the Sisters of Charity of Halifax. By 1935, the church had to be enlarged, increasing its seating capacity from 272 to approximately 650. Following the Second World War, the population of Queens expanded dramatically, and St. Nicholas increasingly became home to Catholics from many different ethnic and cultural backgrounds.
By the late 1950s, even the enlarged church could no longer accommodate the parish community. In May 1959 alone, the Confirmation class numbered 418 students. Plans were therefore made for the construction of a larger church. Parishioners contributed generously, even donating gold and silver that could be recast into sacred vessels. Auxiliary Bishop John J. Boardman blessed the cornerstone on March 16, 1963, and Bishop Bryan J. McEntegart dedicated the new church on August 1, 1964. A time capsule placed during its construction preserved photographs of parish families, a parish bulletin, and a copy of The Tablet as a witness to that moment in the parish’s history. The Tablet’s centennial history records these important milestones.
In the years following the Second Vatican Council, St. Nicholas of Tolentine embraced the Council’s call for greater participation by the laity and a renewed awareness of the cultural and pastoral needs of the people. A parish council was formed, lay ministries expanded, and the parish began to respond more intentionally to the changing population of Jamaica. Hispanic ministry developed after Father James Wenzel, O.S.A., responded to an emergency involving a Spanish-speaking family and realized that language prevented him from communicating with them. He sought the assistance of Sister Cataline Conroy, S.C., who had recently returned from missionary service in Peru. This experience became an important step in establishing a more organized ministry to the parish’s growing Hispanic community.
From Augustinian to Diocesan Leadership
For eight decades, the Augustinian Friars formed and served St. Nicholas of Tolentine Parish, leaving a lasting spiritual inheritance rooted in community, friendship, interior prayer, service to the poor, and unity of heart and mind in God. In 1997, following a difficult decision by their provincial leadership, the Augustinians withdrew from the parish. Father William Waters, O.S.A., who served as pastor from 1993 to 1997, was the final Augustinian pastor. Pastoral responsibility was then entrusted to priests of the Diocese of Brooklyn. Although the friars departed, the Augustinian character of the parish continued through its patron, its traditions, and the faith of generations formed by their ministry.
In 2002, the parish began a $1.5 million campaign to renovate the church. The completed worship space was rededicated by Bishop Thomas V. Daily in 2003. Other additions, including the outdoor Marian Garden, provided parishioners and visitors with places for prayer and quiet reflection. The parish also developed a wide range of ministries serving both its members and the surrounding neighborhood, including religious education, youth and young-adult ministry, care for the homebound, a homeless shelter, a soup kitchen, a food pantry, English-language classes, blood drives, disability advocacy, respect-life activities, and the St. Vincent de Paul Society.
The Centennial Celebration
In 2017, St. Nicholas of Tolentine joyfully celebrated its 100th anniversary. Under the leadership of Father John Francis, the parish marked the centennial with a year of prayer, remembrance, music, fellowship, and thanksgiving. A first-class relic of St. Nicholas of Tolentine was obtained from the saint’s basilica in Tolentino, Italy, and was presented for public veneration. The students and teachers of the Catholic Academy also gathered for a special prayer service and veneration of the relic. The Tablet recorded the relic’s arrival and its importance to the centennial celebration.
More than 70 parishioners who had belonged to St. Nicholas for at least 30 years were honored during a special Mass and reception on May 7, 2017; ten of them had been members for more than 60 years. Other anniversary events included a concert presented by the parish choirs, a family picnic, and a centennial dinner dance on September 9. The jubilee concluded around the September 10 feast of St. Nicholas of Tolentine with a solemn Mass of thanksgiving celebrated by Bishop Nicholas DiMarzio. At the time of the centennial, the parish celebrated six weekend Masses with an average attendance of approximately 1,900 people and supported some 75 groups and ministries. The parish that began with 16 families had become a large, active, and multicultural Catholic community. The Tablet’s 2017 parish profile described a community shaped by welcome, lay leadership, spiritual formation, and service to those in need.
Faithfulness Through New Challenges
The years following the centennial brought both blessings and significant challenges. During the COVID-19 pandemic, the parish found new ways to sustain prayer, worship, and pastoral care while responding to restrictions on public gatherings and concern for the health of parishioners. When the community was able to gather more fully again, St. Nicholas continued the work of rebuilding parish life, inviting people back to the Eucharist, strengthening its ministries, and serving families affected by illness, isolation, unemployment, and food insecurity.
A particularly painful moment came in 2026 with the closing of St. Nicholas of Tolentine Catholic Academy at the conclusion of the 2025–2026 academic year. Founded as the parish school in 1929, it had provided nearly a century of Catholic education to generations of children. Declining enrollment and continuing financial challenges led to the difficult decision to close the academy. Its history, however, remains inseparable from the history of the parish, and the faith, knowledge, friendships, and values formed within its classrooms continue in the lives of its students, graduates, teachers, religious sisters, staff members, and families. The Diocese of Brooklyn’s announcement reported that enrollment had declined from approximately 320 students in 2019 to 144 in 2025.
In July 2026, Father Patrick H. Longalong became pastor of St. Nicholas of Tolentine. His appointment carried a special significance because he had grown up in the parish, received the Sacrament of Confirmation there, served at the altar, and remained part of the community until entering the seminary. His return as pastor opened a new chapter in the parish’s history: one rooted in gratitude for those who built the parish and attentive to the pastoral needs of a new generation.
Today, St. Nicholas of Tolentine remains a welcoming Catholic community enriched by many cultures and united in the Word of God and the Eucharist. Its English, Spanish, Filipino, Caribbean, African, and other cultural communities reflect the diversity of Jamaica and of the universal Church. The parish continues its commitment to worship, faith formation, loving service, care for the homebound and the poor, and the building of unity among its parishioners. More than a century after the first Mass was celebrated in 1917, the mission entrusted to the Augustinian Fathers continues: to proclaim Jesus Christ, to gather people into a community of faith, and to serve the people of Jamaica with one mind and one heart intent upon God.