Greetings from Santiago de Compostella

you might wonder what Santiago de Compostella has to do with Detroit. well today it just so happened that former auxiliary bishop of Detroit, Daniel Flores, celebrated mass at this 800 year old Cathedral. His excellency is now the bishop of Brownsville, TX. Here is a picture.

Pilgrimage Success!

Other than a sprained foot, a sprained ankle, and probably more than a few blisters the Pilgrimage for Christian Culture down Woodward Avenue went very well. Over 40 young adults participated in the activities which included a skit about Blessed Pier Giorgio Frassati, Mass in the Extraordinary form for the Nativity of St. John the Baptist at Shrine of the Little Flower (pictures), 3 ordinary form Masses, and of course plenty of walking, praying, and singing. We had Latin Rite participants from 4 (arch)dioceses (Detroit, Lansing, Saginaw, and Chicago), 3 Chaldeans, and one Syro-Malabar.

I have many pictures including some of historic Churches of course. I hope to have more time to post these! For now here is one of the group upon entering the city of Detroit.

Young Adult Pilgrimage in Detroit

Readers, I have been busy not only with work, but with planning. I am part of a group planning a pilgrimage starting at St. Vincent de Paul in Pontiac, following mostly along Woodward Avenue and ending at the Detroit River. As this is over 30 miles this is a 2 day affair.

Day 1 (June 24th, the Solemnity of St. John the Baptist) will start with Holy Mass celebrated at the aforementioned St. Vincent de Paul, part of the newly formed Pontiac community parish of St. Damien of Molokai. Our first major stop is St. Hugo of the Hills where we will have lunch and an opportunity to view the beautiful stone chapel on their sprawling campus. We shall pay a visit to Manresa, the Jesuit retreat center. Our first day concludes at Shrine of the Little Flower in Royal Oak where we will have dinner, confessions available, a skit about St. Pier Giorgio Frassati, a mass for those unable to make the early one, and the opportunity for Adoration in Shrine's perpetual Adoration chapel. We will be sleeping in the area.

Day 2 (June 25th) starts with morning prayer followed by Shrine's 8:30 am Mass followed by breakfast. After breakfast our journey resumes. We will stop by St. James in Ferndale for lunch. Other planned stops include St. John the Baptist Romanian Byzantine Church, Cathedral of the Most Blessed Sacrament, St. Patrick (where we will celebrate the anticipated Sunday mass), and the original site of Ste. Anne de Detroit (now denoted by a plaque).

Please consider joining us as we walk, pray, sing, and enjoy fellowship with fellow young adults.
Partial participation is allowed, so if you can do only one day, or only join us for Friday night's festivities or one of the masses that is very welcome.

More information including links to the Facebook events for day 1 and day 2 can be found at our website.

Upcoming Church Tour: June 10th

Hey readers, I saw that some people found the site looking for Church tours, so I thought I should give a heads up regarding an upcoming tour.

Next weekend is the Call to Holiness conference. An optional part of the conference is a church tour on Friday June 10th. I am not sure if there are any spots available at this time, but give them a call and find out.

Call to Holiness Church Tour

All five churches have been featured here so you can get a preview on this very blog. Click on the appropriate "tag" below to see posts about the churches: St. Aloysius, Old St. Mary, Sweetest Heart of Mary, Holy Family, and Ste. Anne.

Church Festivals: St. Sebastian and St. Joan of Arc

This weekend is the St. Sebastian Spring Festival.

Also the St. Joan of Arc Spring Festival.

I'm not very familiar with either of these festivals, but I would imagine that they are a lot of fun.

Check them out!

Church Festivals: St. Florian Strawberry Festival May 7-8

It's Spring, so it is the beginning of Church Festival season!

I probably missed one already, but tonight starts the St. Florian Strawberry Festival!

This is as good of an excuse as any (except Holy Mass, but you can go to that too) to visit 1929's best new church! Here is the Schedule:


If you come you can see vestments of Blessed John Paul II which are on display in the Sanctuary. (Or at least they have been all week) Other features to check out are the Divine Mercy and Our Lady of Czestochowa chapels which are located off of the vestibule. I don't know if they have guided tours, but the Church will be open.

Vestments worn by JP2 in his 1987 visit to Hamtramck

I'll try to keep you all apprised of other Festivals. These festivals are a great way to support the historical and beautiful Churches of Detroit!

What are you waiting for? Get down to St. Florian!

If you would like your church's festival featured send me an e-mail or write in the comments.

Three New Auxiliary Bishops AND a Patroness! (Plus SHMS Photos)

Today is a great day in Detroit! At 2pm this afternoon the liturgy of Ordination for Bishops Hanchon, Byrnes, and Cepeda began. CTND will be re-airing the Mass several times, and they stream online. At this liturgy a decree from the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments was also read declaring St. Anne the official Patroness for the Archdiocese of Detroit. (I think I'll plan on going to Ste. Anne de Detroit for her feast July 26. Archbishop Vigneron will be celebrating Mass)

While I did not attend the Ordination Mass, I did go to the reception at Sacred Heart Major Seminary. Whilst there I slipped into the chapel and took some photos. I also took photos of the exterior. These were all taken with my phone.

Sacred Heart Major Seminary (from whose site I gathered much of this information) was founded in 1919 by Bishop Gallagher, and they broke ground at Linwood and Chicago 4 years later. The first ordination class was in 1930. The chapel is beautiful with it's carved oak reredos and its share of the state's largest collection of Pewabic Tile.

We'll start with an external shot as viewed from the parking lot. The website tells me the Architecture is English Tudor Gothic.


Then we'll move into the chapel and have a look at the sanctuary. I think there was just enough light and it made for a pretty shot.


We find more carved oak at the Mary altar.


Here is an example of the stained glass.*


Oh yeah I almost forgot: I rubbed elbows with the youngest Bishop (Cepeda) in the United States.


Hurray for new Bishops! Benedicamus Domino! Ste Anne, pray for us!

Links and such:

• Ste Anne posts
• Bishop Hanchon will remain pastor of Holy Redeemer.
• Sacred Heart Major Seminary
• Meet the Bishops
• St. Anne Patroness of Detroit Press Release

*Update: I had originally indicated that the Stained Glass had been designed by Michigan resident Margaret Bouchez Cavanaugh. She indeed designed the glass for the 2 house chapels in the resident wings but not the main chapel. Her glass was featured in the Winter 2011 Mosaic Magazine, so you can check them out there. (Starts on page 30)
Thanks to reader Tim for the correction and the tip on Mosaic.

St. Hedwig

I first promised a post on St. Hedwig in the early days of this blog. I most recently visited St. Hedwig this past Friday for First Friday Mass and stations, but the pictures I will feature were actually taken on the same day I visited St. Hyacinth.

I only found out (or maybe was reminded) recently that St. Hedwig was my Grandfather's parish and is where my mother was baptized. Intrepid reader, you may have guessed that this is a Polish church and indeed it is. The best ones are!

Święta Jadwiga is the 13th century Duchess, rather than the 14th century King (yes King) of Poland. The latter was not canonized (by the Church) until 1997, so a Church founded in 1903 wouldn't be named for her. (Or would it?)

I will post a few pictures to wet your whistle, but I tell you there are scores more on the virtual tour they have on their site. I have only looked at a small portion of the tour, and I already recommend it.

St. Hedwig and her 8 year-old banners stand proudly on Junction street, .3 miles Southeast of Michigan Avenue


The usher saw me looking around and taking pictures while he prepared for the 4pm Mass. He graciously turned the lights on in the Sanctuary. The high altar really is a sight as they often are.


I like this side altar. I hadn't seen St Therese portrayed in this way in statuary. St. Therese is letting down from heaven the shower of roses assisted by the Blessed Virgin and the Christ child. The roses are in what would appear to be the burial shroud of Christ which hangs from cross. It kind of tells the whole story.

Links:

• More of my pictures will be found if you start clicking through here on my Picasa album.
• If you want more check out St. Hedwig's virtual tour. Again, I haven't seen all of it, but it looks pretty exhaustive.
• St. Hedwig's website.
• Mass Schedule

Pope Benedict appoints Auxiliary Bishops for Detroit

This is exciting news.

May 5th of this year will see the ordination of 2 Detroit priests as bishops to serve as auxiliary bishops.

Our auxiliaries were depleted as they were selected to run other dioceses or retired.
Nienstedt is now St Paul/Minneapolis, Blair now Toledo, Boyea now Lansing, Hurley now Grand Rapids, Quinn now Winona, and Flores is now Brownsville, TX. Gumbleton and Anderson resigned. This is just in the last 10 years.

Joining Bishop Francis Reiss in assisting Archbishop Vigneron will be Fr. Michael Byrnes and Msgr. Donald Hanchon. Both are pastors of churches featured on this blog: Byrnes of POLOV and Hanchon of Holy Redeemer. Interestingly enough, Fr. Byrnes went to the same High School and College that I did.

Diane from Te Deum Laudamus broke the news to me, and it is on the archdiocesan website.

Notes and News 3/16/2011

You may have noticed that I haven't posted in a while. I started a new job on February 28 and I am still working on the whole work/life balance. I have some activities that are finishing up so I should have more time for blogging soon.

I want to bring to your attention 2 events for this weekend:

• St. Joseph Day of Prayer at Historic St. Joseph in Detroit: There is a full day of Mass, music and devotions on Saturday March 19th for the Solemnity of St. Joseph. See the full schedule on the parish website.
• Monthly Mass at Historic St. Albertus: Mass will be celebrated in the Extraordinary form at Noon this Sunday March 20th. See the full mass schedule for 2011 here.

If there are any other special things going on at your parish or a Church you like to visit, send me an e-mail at 313churchblog @ gmail or put a note in the comments.