Feast of the Dedication

Yesterday was the Feast of the Dedication of the Lateran Basilica. Last year we were in Trinidad and the priest explained why this church in Rome is even more important than St. Peter's. I forget the details but I remember that this is the only feast in honor of a building. This year it happened to fall on a Sunday.

Joe was particularly pleased with the musical selections he'd worked out for the Uillean pipes: “City of God” and “The Church's One Foundation”. We attend an English-language mass held in a small chapel at the Vatican Embassy to Turkmenistan. The congregation is an eclectic group with regulars from Korea, the Philippines, Poland... The largest contingent is from Lebanon. One week they sang “Ave Maria” in Arabic. It was stunning.

The priests are Polish. The more senior of the two, Father Andre, said mass last night. After announcing the general theme and recapping the readings which relate the body to a temple, he said he wanted to finish his short homily by telling us about a dream. He dreams that one day, when the government agrees to permit the religion, they'll be able to dedicate a Roman Catholic Church in Turkmenistan. He wants the church to be modeled after a yurt, the round Central Asian tent dwelling. The significance of this lies in a saying that when travelers find the door to a yurt open they will live but if the door is closed they will die because from extreme temperature and harsh desert conditions. The church of his dreams is a symbol to the idea that the Church's door is always open.