Dear Sisters and Brothers —
Many will remember our Home4Dinner Sundays back in late 2019 and early 2020, before they were interrupted by the pandemic. Well, they are coming back! We will have four Home4Dinner events, the first of which is Sunday, October 1. Mark your calendars today!
For those who were not part of St. Ignatius Parish at the time, Home4Dinner was born out of an experience we had at the 10:00 am Mass on Pentecost in June 2019. The occasion was the 25th anniversary of my ordination, and so many people kindly gathered to celebrate. The church was very full, and people sat in the forward pews. The music was stunning (when is it not?), and our voices filled the majestic space above us. At the end of the homily, all those present raised their hands in blessing over my father as I anointed him before his surgery the next day. At the end of Mass, you again raised your hands to bless me in my ministry as priest and pastor. Filled with overflowing joy and deep goodwill, we then adjourned to a spectacular picnic outside. It was the best experience of Pentecost I have ever known — the Holy Spirit was among us that day, and we could feel it.
A few weeks later, I described the event to some friends over dinner. I likened my experience of Mass that day to that of my Sicilian grandmother who enjoyed to the depths of her being having her entire family around her dining room table the first Sunday of each month — that Pentecost Sunday, our entire spiritual family was home. As it was important for the Bonfiglio family to be all together regularly, it came clear to me that it was important for our faith community to be all together. And I wanted more of it. So, as Nana expected her family to be home for dinner once a month, that fall, I set the expectation for my family to be at Jesus’ table once a month, followed by a meal together. Thus was born Home4Dinner.
And we’re going Back Home4Dinner this year! We will again have four events, but they will be spread out over the course of the year: October 1, December 3, February 3, and May 4. As we did four years ago, for the first two, we will have only one Mass that weekend, at 10:00 a.m., followed by lunch.
One of the reasons that we are bringing back Home4Dinner is that in the last year, as we have moved further out of the pandemic, many parishioners have asked for it. They, like me and the rest of the parish staff, recognize that the Spirit was doing something in us and to us through our H4D gatherings. By praying together as a whole faith community and eating a meal together, often with parishioners we hadn’t previously met, the Holy Spirit was somehow binding us together and giving us a deeper sense of community and belonging. That experience of belonging is as important as it has ever been as we continue to emerge from Covid, as we navigate the divisions in our church and our country, and as we seek to live out our faith.
Just as Nana knew the importance of gathering us together and imposed upon us the warm obligation to be there, our ability to create a community of welcome and inclusion requires our commitment. So I want to share with you my own warm obligation on those four weekends, to attend Mass and join us for lunch. Please mark your calendars now. (Also, please note that the May H4D is still taking shape, so those details found elsewhere in the bulletin may change.)
Please pray for this endeavor. I think that it will give God and the Spirit ample opportunity to do something wonderful among and for us. And, as always, oremus pro invicem.
Fr. Greg