Unless you have moved often during your lifetime, I bet somewhere, tucked in a box among your ancient personal effects, is a collection of memorabilia that identify you as Catholic. They will probably distinguish you as once registered in a specific Catholic church or school. In this box of treasures you might find certain artifacts that identified the history of your adolescence: a small baptismal candle, half burned, bearing the name St. Casmir and a date inscribed thereon. Digging deeper, you may also find a brown scapular that looked like it had been through the laundry a few times or a miraculous medal indicating that you once belonged to a sorority of young ladies. You may even find there a small diadem of dried flowers you wore at a May Crowning. From your Catholic boyhood you may come upon a parish-scouting award. Without doubt, these describe a certain unremembered period of your Catholic history.
I thought it appropriate, therefore, to speak of our Catholic identity on this forthcoming feast of the Dedication of the Church of Saint John Lateran in Rome; it is the mother church of all Catholics around the world.
I have visited Saint John Lateran Basilica only once in my life. On this particular Sunday, however, we witnessed the celebration of the sacrament of First Holy Communion. This huge edifice which once belonged to the distinguished Roman Laterani family was still an active parish that celebrated the Catholic festivals all of us once celebrated in our own childhood.
It may be true of many of us that we have long since identified ourselves with churches of other names in other localities. Nonetheless, the community of Christians that once wrapped us in the mantle of the faith still stands as a sign of what churches are supposed to be: members of a community at a certain time and place, identified as the people of God.
The bishops at the Second Vatican Council (1962-1965) affirmed that the clearest example of what church is and what it means is found in these little parishes on the corner, named for a saint or one of the mysteries of the Christian faith. This is where the people of God assemble Sunday after Sunday to celebrate the divine mysteries. This is where you will be welcomed home even though you may have become lost during all the intervening years since childhood. In other words, the local parish is the authentic church.
It may not be adorned with gold or precious statues; it may not be a former home of a notable family. Nonetheless its singularity stems from the fact that countless people in past ages have found there the strongest evidence that God is present among his people.
The fact, for instance, that Catholics of a particular parish will take their grievance to officials at the Vatican when a local bishop decides to close their parish or combine it with a parish of a different name, speaks of the fierce devotion and unique relationship that ordinary folks have for this place of worship which they themselves may well have built. It is no small matter, therefore to claim that you are still a member of this particular church. Check your memorabilia, they will remind you.
Scriptures for Nov. 9
Ezekiel 47: 1-2, 8-9, 12
1 Cor. 3: 9c-11, 16-17
John 2: 13-22
The writer formerly served the Anchorage Archdiocese as director of pastoral education. He now lives in Notre Dame, Indiana.
'Parish loyalties reveal a deep truth'
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