We celebrate together the great moments: birth and baptism, death and funerals; first communions and confirmations and marriages. And we celebrate the ordinary moments: raising kids and paying bills and growing older year by year.We reach out. We're like our biblical forebears who were always sent on a mission. So our neighborhood and its people are brothers and sisters to us. We join them in the deliberate pursuit of a better life for all our neighborhood people and their families. We share with them a responsibility for the needy among us; we've come to recognize that it's among our poorest neighbors that Jesus awaits us. And so we share what we have.

We want to be a drum major for justice. We want to be an active reliable partner in the struggle to make our city a gentler, kinder place to live and raise a family. So we work to eliminate racism, sexism, ethnic bias and religious bigotry.

We cherish cultural distinctiveness. We seek very deliberately to include all manner of race and color and nationality. We try to express ourselves in the style and culture of each.

We cherish our members with disabilities. They enrich our parish by their special experience of life. We pray and work in partnership with them particularly to assure that the disabled can participate fully in the life of our community.

In the Lord and his Spirit, we are this church.

Parish History

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St. Martin de Porres Parish was established in 1990 upon the merging of the parishes of Saint Ann and Saint
Teresa of Avila. St. Martin de Porres Parish emerged as a racially and ethnically diverse parish with an active
outreach in the Central City of Toledo.
In 1899 St. Ann parish was established and for nearly 100 years operated St. Ann School. Do to the merging of
parishes and the necessary closing of schools St. Ann School became St. Martin de Porres School. In 2002 St.
Martin de Porres school closed and Englewood Peace Academy was begun. After Englewood Peace Academy
closed in 2011 the buildings were leased to Imagine Clay Avenue Chart School and most recently, 2021, the
former school buildings have become The St. Martin de Porres Community Center with a mission of ‘providing
affordable, safe, welcoming spaces for activities that will fulfill the growing needs of the community for present
and future generations.
St. Martin de Porres Parish is noted for its dynamic liturgies, its commitment to youth, its outreach to the elderly
through the Parish Nurse Program and it is most clearly defined for its social ministry. The Parish Social
Concerns Office works with the St. Vincent de Paul Society in response to immediate needs of our neighbors,
and also has a weekly community food pantry. St. Martin de Porres also sponsors The Claver House, a
hospitality kitchen that serves breakfast five days a week, and the St. Martin de Porres Community Center,
providing spaces for local programming. The Padua Center, an educational outreach program is affiliated with
St. Martin de Porres.
Truly, St. Martin de Porres Parish is empowered by the Spirit and enriched by diversity. It is a parish that shines
forth into the Central City of Toledo.