For more than 280 years, Catholics in Lancaster have gathered just south of the city’s center to worship at Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary Church atop a prominent slope along Prince Street. Its faithful parishioners first began attending Holy Mass in a log chapel in 1742 there until it was burned a week before Christmas by anti-Catholic arsonists bent on driving Catholics out of the Red Rose City.
On May 4, Bishop Timothy Senior, just returned home from a Diocesan pilgrimage to Italy pilgrimage during which he attended Pope Francis’ funeral, celebrated Holy Mass which also included first Holy Communion for 13 young parishioners. After Mass on the third Sunday of Easter, the bishop, along with the pastor, Father Brian Olkowski, opened the parish’s annual 40 Hours Eucharistic Devotion that speaks to the centrality of the Eucharist in all Catholics’ lives and to honor their patroness, the Blessed Mother, in the month of May.
Father Olkowski thanked the bishop for his pastoral visit, which also featured a luncheon in the parish hall. “I am grateful to the first Holy Communion families today because it is a very important day; it is a day we all remember, and it is a day you will, too. But let us also remember that there is a second, third, fourth Communion and one that is ongoing throughout your lives from now on,” Father Olkowski said.
St. Mary’s is noted for having the longest serving pastor in the history of the Diocese in Father Bernard Keenan – an Irish-born priest who served for 49 years in the 19th century. He was also the Diocese’s first ever Vicar General until his death in 1877.
In his homily based on the Sunday’s reading, Bishop Senior noted, “After the apostles see the Risen Lord – the Risen Jesus – they are no longer afraid. What could they possibly be afraid of? They are not scared for now they know their fate, too…. If we attend to Jesus, we will not suffer in the darkness. Jesus gives Peter a mission to tend to His sheep, feed His sheep and he gives us a mission too – to live our faith openly. It is a precious moment these young people are experiencing here with their first Holy Communion.”
For more than 280 years, the Catholic faith has been alive in central Lancaster city.
(Photos by Chris Heisey, The Catholic Witness.)
By Chris Heisey, The Catholic Witness
