Chicagoland

Asian Catholics gather for first community Mass

By Michelle Martin | Staff writer
Wednesday, July 26, 2017

Asian Catholics come together for community Mass

About 1,500 members of various Asian ethnic communities gathered for the first Asian community Mass July 23, 2017 at St. Henry Parish, 5326 N. Hoyne Ave. The celebration included a Marian procession and dinner.
About 1,500 members of various Asian ethnic communities gathered for the first Asian community Mass July 23 at St. Henry Parish, 5326 N. Hoyne Ave. The celebration included a Marian procession and dinner. (Karen Callaway/Chicago Catholic)
Vietnamese girls dressed in the color of Mary participate in the procession preceding the first Asian community Mass July 23. (Karen Callaway/Chicago Catholic)
Members of the Asian Community from India carry a Marian statue of Our Lady of Vailankanni in a procession prior to Mass. (Karen Callaway/Chicago Catholic)
The congregation listens to Father Aloysius Funtila, director of the Asian Catholic Initiative at the Asian community Mass July 23. (Karen Callaway/Chicago Catholic)
first Asian community Mass July 23 at St. Henry Parish, 5326 N. Hoyne Ave. (Karen Callaway/Chicago Catholic)
Vietnamese women dressed in the color of Mary process in front of a statue of Our Lady of LaVang. (Karen Callaway/Chicago Catholic)
About 1,500 members of various Asian ethnic communities gathered for the first Asian community Mass celebrated by Cardinal Cupich July 23 at St. Henry Parish, 5326 N. Hoyne Ave. The celebration included a Marian procession and dinner. (Karen Callaway/Chicago Catholic)

For Asuncion Donato, the Asian community Mass held July 23 at St. Henry Parish, 6325 N. Hoyne Ave., was a bit like being back in the Philippines.

“That’s how we used to do it when we had a special Mass,” said Donato, a member of Holy Name Cathedral Parish. “People from all the different provinces, all the regions, would come and they would bring statues and have a procession.”

Donato brought a statue of Our Lady of Piat, the patroness of her home province. The participants in the procession and Mass represented a much wider span of Asian countries and cultures.

The procession, lined up in alphabetical order, included members of the Chinese, Indian, Indonesian, Korean, Lao, Filipino and Vietnamese Catholic communities, many wearing the cultural dress of their home countries and carrying their own images of Mary.

Organizers estimate that about 1,500 people from various communities joined the celebration, which included the procession, Mass and a dinner with food from all the participating communities. Twenty-five Asian priests and Bishop Vincent Long Van Nguyen of Parramatta, Australia, concelebrated the Mass with Cardinal Cupich.

A procession around the neighborhood took place before threatening clouds, thunder and rain pushed organizers to move the Mass inside St. Henry Church. People stood shoulder to shoulder and sat on stools in the aisles. Many who could not be accommodated in the sanctuary joined in the worship from the church basement.

“I guess God wanted us to be inside to be closer to one another so that we would all know we are one family,” said Cardinal Cupich, who formed the Asian Catholic Initiative to help express the needs and the goals of the various Asian communities. The July 23 Mass at St. Henry, which offers Mass every Sunday in Vietnamese and English, was the first to bring all the Asian communities together.

Lito Pineda, who attended with several Filipino parishioners from Transfiguration Parish, said he liked the idea of getting all of the Asian groups together.

“This way you can see the unity of the Asian community,” he said.

Cynthia Mennella, a member of the Indonesian community that worships at St. Therese Chinese Catholic Church, said she thinks events like the Mass and the Asian Catholic Initiative will foster more communication among the Asian groups.

“This can help us get to know what’s going on,” she said. “We’re together with all the friends from all the Asian communities. I think it’s a positive movement.”

Cardinal Cupich spoke highly of the contributions of Asian Catholics, both in the archdiocese and in the wider community. All of the communities represented at the Mass honor Mary as their mother, and all place great emphasis on the importance of families, he said.

“One of the things from the Asian community that the church desperately needs today is the way you care for your families, the way that you teach respect to your children, the way that you care for the elderly,” the cardinal said. “There is something very strong in the Asian culture that honors those who are elders, but also teaches children and accompanies them.”

He also highlighted the diversity of cultures in the archdiocese, where Sunday Mass is celebrated in 26 languages, many of them from Asian countries.

“Take pride in the cultures you are from,” he said. “Too often in the past, in the life of the church, we have so limited the experience of the Catholic faith to the western world. Pope Francis is saying to the whole world, no, we need to pay attention to all cultures because they are like the dough, and the yeast is God’s grace, and the church is better when the elements in that dough — the culture — can rise because of the inspiration of God working.”

At the end of the Mass, he made a direct appeal for more vocations to the priesthood and religious life from the Asian community.

“Some of the best priests we have here in the archdiocese are those of Asian descent,” Cardinal Cupich said. “They are hardworking and they are smart and they love their people. We need more priests like that.”

Topics:

  • asian community

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