Celebrating families

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This article was published 18/06/2022 (1550 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Although she always planned to raise her family in the Roman Catholic church, Janelle Vielfaure didn’t expect to have to cope with the fallout of a global pandemic while her children were infants.

“As a newly married couple, we always imagined going to church every Sunday and our kids growing up among other families,” says the mother of three young daughters.

“We didn’t have that at all.”

Instead, Vielfaure and her husband Eric spent most of the last two years at home with their children, now ages four, two and nine months old, rarely attending services because of gathering restrictions to limit the spread of COVID-19.

Now back in the pews at their home parish of St. Boniface Cathedral, Vielfaure realizes that not only did her young children miss out on worship experiences, but many other parishioners missed seeing her family every weekend.

“I did notice when we started coming back the elderly people gravitated toward us,” she says of the response of older parishioners.

“It just makes their day to see our kid and every Sunday they come to us and say they are happy to see us.”

Making up the nucleus of any congregation, families of all shapes and sizes will be celebrated in a big way on Sunday, June 19, at an outdoor mass at St. Boniface Cathedral, marking the conclusion of the World Year of Families in the Catholic Church. Sponsored by the dioceses of Winnipeg and St. Boniface, the event precedes a worldwide gathering of families in Rome on June 26.

“This is a really great opportunity to get together as a community and celebrate families,” says organizer Sophie Freynet-Agossa, co-ordinator of marriage, family and life service for the Archdiocese of St. Boniface.

“Times have been hard for families, and I think families need to celebrate.”

Freynet-Agossa attended the previous world meeting of families, held in Philadelphia in 2015.

The morning begins with a rosary prayer at 10 a.m. and mass in French and English at 10:30 a.m. presided by Archbishop Albert LeGatt and Rev. Ward Jamieson, marking the first time in three years a large public event has been held at the Cathedral.

Sunday’s event, which falls on Father’s Day, will also feature readings in many of the languages spoken in the diocese, including Vietnamese, Tagalog, Ukrainian, Eritrean and Spanish.

That inclusion speaks to the diversity of Roman Catholics in Manitoba, says Andrew De Leon, who moved to Canada from the Philippines two decades ago and now attend St. Anthony of Padua Roman Catholic parish.

“We should be united and celebrate Christ as a family,” says De Leon, one of the readers for the Sunday mass.

“It’s a more visual representation to who we are as families of different cultures.”

Living in a multi-generational household of five adults, De Leon says Filipino culture views family as broad, flexible groups, including friends, neighbours and distant relatives.

“I think we are called to be in community with other people and not be exclusive,” says De Leon.

“When there’s a need in a family, everyone pitches in, and everyone comes to your aid.”

That sense of pitching in led Diane Belanger to organize a teen-specific liturgy during the Sunday masses at St. Boniface Cathedral a month ago. After seeing more families attend once restrictions eased, she now offers a short liturgy and discussion time in the cathedral basement specifically for teens, attracting about 20 each Sunday.

“I’m amazed about it and the people in the parish are amazed about it,” says Belanger, catechism co-ordinator for French parishes in the Archdiocese of St. Boniface.

“They (the teens) are the church of today and tomorrow and we have to do something for them.”

In addition to Sunday’s large celebration, the Archdiocese of St. Boniface plans to hold another community event on Friday, July 1, when it reprises the annual Canada Day multicultural mass and celebration on the Cathedral grounds, last held in 2019.

brenda@suderman.com

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