This church is a landmark on Detroit’s far west side and a surviving reminder of the area’s once thriving Greek community.
The parish’s origins stretch back to the late 19th century, when Detroit saw a notable increase in immigrants from Greece. A good number of them had fled economic woes that followed the country's war for independence that raged from 1821 to 1832. By the 1920s, many had settled on what is now the city’s far west side, and they began meeting for religious services in a rented hall on Myrtle Street. These Greek Detroiters formed a congregation, choosing the name St. Constantine and Helen Greek Community Church. It was formally established in 1930 with the election of its first board of trustees.
The namesake saints
During a period when Christians were persecuted in the Third and Fourth centuries, Ste. Helen (sometimes written as Helena) and her son St. Constantine are credited with not only decriminalizing Christianity but allowing it to thrive and spread. Both Ste. Helen and St. Constantine are revered as being “equal to the Apostles” in the Byzantine Catholic and Eastern Orthodox churches for their efforts to spread the religion.
Constantine became ruler of the Roman Empire in 307 A.D., though his claim to the throne was contested by Maxentius. They would settle the matter on the battlefield, but before they clashed, the outnumbered Constantine said he envisioned in the sky a cross and the words "By this sign, conquer." And conquer he did. Taking his vision to mean that Jesus had aided him in his victory, he "found religion" and ended the persecution of Christians with the Edict of Milan in 313 AD.
He would become the first Christian emperor. Constantine also rebuilt the ancient Greek city of Byzantium, naming it Nova Roma (New Rome). The city was renamed Constantinople in his honor, and would serve as the capital of the Greek Orthodox Empire until 1453. Today, it is known as Istanbul, Turkey.
After becoming emperor, Constantine’s mother, Helen, began searching for the actual cross on which Jesus Christ was crucified more than 300 years earlier. As the story goes, she found a site where three crosses were buried. Unsure which was Christ's and which were the two thieves, she asked a sick woman to come and venerate the three crosses. When she kissed the cross of Jesus, she was said to have been healed. Then, as the story goes, a dead body was brought and laid on the true cross and said to have been brought back to life.
The two saints are celebrated by the Orthodox Church on May 21 and on Sept. 14, the feast day of the Elevation of the Holy Cross.
A new home that looks far older
When the congregation was first founded in 1930, it held services in a member’s home for the first two years before moving to a meeting hall located above the Strand Theatre at Grand River Avenue and Fourteenth Street. During this time, the church’s members were raising money for a building fund to erect a home of their own. The congregation got the go-ahead from the Archdiocese of North and South America in 1937.
In 1938, the parish was reorganized with 373 families after the Rev. Father Alexander Papastephanos became pastor. "Steady growth of the parish over the past eight years has made the quarters at 4750 Grand River inadequate," the Detroit Free Press reported May 29, 1948, so it set out to build a new and permanent home of its own.
The parish also had a school, which had around 50 students in 1944 who learned Greek, religion and self-government. Classes met five times a week from 4 to 6 p.m.
By 1942, the congregation had grown more than threefold, to 1,300 families, making it the largest Greek parish in the city. "As soon as the war is over, the parishioners expect to build a new and more spacious church in true Byzantine style," the Detroit Free Press reported July 19, 1942. In 1944, the congregation purchased the property for it on the southeast corner of Oakman Boulevard and West Chicago.
The new 1,000-seat Sts. Constantine & Helen Church and its adjoining youth center would be the result of years of planning. The tab would be about $300,000, the equivalent of about $4.3 million in 2026, when adjusted for inflation.
Ground was broken for the church on June 6, 1948, and its cornerstone was placed that Nov. 28. Bishop Athenagoras of Boston, who was slated to become the head of the Eastern Orthodox Church in North and South America, helped lay the cornerstone after participating in the celebration of the Divine Liturgy at St. Constantine’s on Grand River.
The church was designed in the Byzantine style and laid out in the form of a Greek cross. A 36-foot copper dome capped off the church. It was designed by Arthur Greig Jr., who repurposed the plans for a nearly identical church on the east side, Assumption Greek Orthodox that opened in 1949.
The new Sts. Constantine & Helen church was dedicated April 16, 1950. Archbishop Michael (Mihail) Constantindes, head of the Greek Orthodox Church in North and South America, and Orthodox priests from around metro Detroit joined the congregation in the dedication of its new home.
The icons on the church's iconostasis were the work of noted Greek artist Spyros Vassiliou. He was commissioned by the church to paint in traditional Byzantine style the 11 icons. Painted in egg tempera upon linen that was adhered to plywood, they depicted the church's patron saints: Madonna, Christ, St. John the Baptist, the Nativity, the baptism of Christ, the entry of Christ into Jerusalem, the Last Supper, the Crucifixion, the descent into Hades and the Ascension. After they were completed, they were displayed at the [Detroit Institute of Arts]( in February 1955 before being installed in the church on Oakman Boulevard that March.
In 1954, plans were unveiled to build a $200,000 Greek community hall next to the church.
By 1960, the congregation was at more than 750 families, down from its peak two decades earlier but still sizable.
In addition to serving Greek-American families on Oakman Boulevard, as the suburbs began to grow, Sts. Constantine and Helen would lead to the creation of two overshoot churches, Holy Cross in Farmington Hills and Nativity of the Virgin Mary in Plymouth Township.
Hard times
By the time the 1980s came around, however, most of the Greek parishioners had left the neighborhood, causing attendance at the church on Oakman to drop. Deciding to remain on the west side, the congregation bought 25 acres on Joy Road between Newburgh and Wayne roads in suburban Westland, where it built the Hellenic Cultural Center, which was opened in 1986. A new church was completed on the property in 1996. The congregation remains in operation and part of the Greek Orthodox Metropolis of Detroit.
The congregation sold the Detroit church to the Maranatha Christian Church in 1986, which used it until around 1998. In the mid-1990s, Maranatha also used the church for the 4801 Theatre, where it offered gospel musicals and other plays. The church folded between 1998 and 2000.
In 2000, the Power of the Word Ministries bought the church, where it ran the First Tabernacle of Detroit Church of God in Christ until it closed in 2013. The church would sit empty and was left to rot for the next 13 years, despite the thriving neighborhood around it. During this time, the church’s copper dome was stolen by scrappers, allowing water to infiltrate the sanctuary and allowing mold to grow. The building’s exterior remained in good condition, however, though vegetation began growing from its steeple.
The church was sold March 27, 2014, to Metro Life International Ministries, a nondenominational church led by Pastor Matt Cripps. The congregation has generated publicity for its children’s outreach ministry, the Good News Gang, which has been in operation since 1989.
“The Lord has provided a wonderful facility,” the congregation’s website said as of October 2026. “We are committed to maximizing our new property for the Glory of God.”
But it never used the rundown church, only the community center next door. The property was delinquent for $20,000 in 2025 taxes, though it is unclear why a church would owe taxes.
In October 2026, the congregation began removing the stained glass windows from the church, and on Oct. 27 of that year, pulled a demolition permit for the building.