February 3, 2002
The Multicultural Church
Have
You Pledged?
We're still collecting pledges for our Bishop's Annual Appeal which
supports the work of the church throughout Long Island and in our parish.
To pledge online
Raising
Voices
I’m
happy to announce that Laura Naughton has agreed to work with the children’s
choir at the Family Mass starting in the fall and that Stephanie Clagnaz
has offered to continue to work with the older children and teens in
the youth choir. The involvement of the young people of our parish is
such a blessing and adds so much to the life of our parish.
Cool Way to Pray
If you’d like to try out a new interactive prayer site online,
go to the St. Brigid’s home page and click on the “Church
Interactive” link.
Away
at College?
If you know of a St. Brigid parishioner who
is away at college, you can help us stay in touch through our parish’s
weekly “letter from home”. Send in their name and e-mail address
just click here.
Today’s
Bible Quote
“Blessed are the peacemakers, they will be called children of God.”
--Matthew 5
Technology Ministry
If you’d like toggle your time and expertise at helping our parish
connect its telephone systems or develop its computer networking or
work on its website, you can let us know by filling in our
online form
El
Salvador Trip
If you’d like to see the parish’s mission trip to
El Salvador online, you can see photos and a travelogue by
clicking here.
Want
to e-mail Father Ralph?
Past Columns:
Jan 27: Appealing
Words
Jan
20:Our Wonderful School
Jan 13: Changing
Times
Jan 6: Farewell Father
Augustine
I recent read an article by Father John Coleman
sj, in which he explored strategies for thinking about the “multi-cultural
parish”. While the article is too long to quote in its entirety,
I thought I’d excerpt a few paragraphs that got me thinking...
“We need to welcome newcomers not as
potential members of a settled Catholic Church in the United States but
as indispensable members of a new Catholic Church, one not yet born. We
do not merely welcome others to share our home but we invite them as co-members
of the church, to rearrange and restructure our home!”
“The recent pastoral statement of the
U.S. Catholic bishops, Welcoming the Stranger Among us: Unity in Diversity
insists that true, multiculturalism is not a call for assimilation or
the disappearance of one culture into another. It sees the many cultures
of the church remaining distinct in some respects yet interacting: respecting
one another, learning from one another; and each changing at its own pace.”
“Immigrants generally become more rather
than less religious than in their home countries...Immigrants, afraid
of losing their identities and values in this vast new land, and fearful
for the virtue and character of their children, turn to religion as the
most potent resource to protect their culture. So the immigrant parish,
much as the black church functioned for Afro-Americans, provides in the
new land a space the immigrants can own as their own.”
My own experience in St. Brigid’s is
that all of these things are developing here. First I speak from the point
of view as an “immigrant” myself. It’s been seven months
since I’ve arrived and I’m still grateful for the welcome I’ve
received. I too am looking for ways in which I can appreciate the distinct
“culture” of St Brigid’s, while at the same time being
able to bring my own gifts and talents to this community.
Secondly, I’m learning how people here
interact in a multi-cultural environment. There is a balance between realizing
an ethnic community’s need to pray and play together and realizing
the parish’s need to celebrate our diversity together. The example
I used at my installation was that we are like the many rooms in God’s
mansion in heaven and we are on adventure to leave our own comfortable
room to go and visit others.
