April 28, 2007

What comes to mind when you think of our parish church? For most people, it isn't the walls, or the furnishings. It's the special events that have been celebrated here and the people you celebrated them with. Maybe you remember the milestones of your childhood celebrated here - First Communion, Confirmation, Reconciliation or special Masses celebrated with your classmates. Maybe the thing that pops to mind is your wedding or the baptism of your children. How blessed and wonderful you felt on those occasions. Maybe you buried a loved one from this church. For you, church is a place that supported you during your greatest heartache.

When you think about it, a great deal of living either happens or gets celebrated here in this church. That's one of the purposed of a church - to give people a focus or central point that grounds their lives and provides a sense of stability on those occasions when they need it most.

Another purpose of a church, and certainly it's most important purpose, is to perform its many functions and celebrate all the events people bring to it in such a way that everything is reflected back to God in whose name it is dedicated. Our Catholic Faith tells us to turn to God in everything, in joy, in sorrow, in gratitude, in guilt and in everything else. Whether it is Confirmation or a wedding, a Baptism or a funeral, or any one of the weekly celebrations we hold her in church, we gather in this house of prayer to recall that we are never alone whether we are dancing with joy, bowed with grief, consumed with worry and apprehension or just living the usual ebb and flow of our every-day lives. Church reminds us that we owe our lives God, no matter what is going on at the moment. We are his people. Jesus shepherds and guides us through everything.

We gather here because Jesus Christ is the shepherd we follow. We come to church to hear and contemplate the story and teachings of Jesus. We come to church to join with our many brothers and sisters in offering up ourselves in gratitude as Jesus offers up himself in the bread and wine, and on the cross. We are the people of the Lord, the sheep of his flock. We find our greatest delight in knowing that God has chosen us and embraces us as his own, and that because of this we are destined to share in his eternal life.

Today we don't just celebrate a ceremony of 50 years ago that opened these doors for business. We celebrate the Community that is St. Vivian Parish. We celebrate what it means to be Catholic. We celebrate that we are Catholic Christians. We celebrate that we are God's people redeemed by the blood of his Son. We are his Church. We belong to him and this gives meaning, direction and focus to our lives. Belonging to Christ gives us great joy. And therefore, we celebrate.