Monsignor Richard McGuinness, a priest from Newark, was the rector of Mount St. Mary’s Seminary during my days as a student. Msgr. McGuinness was a very talented priest, but also a humble man who had a simple way of expressing himself. One of his pieces of advice was to include food at every gathering as a way of keeping things friendly and community-oriented. He gave that advice with the very simple phrase, “When you meet, eat.”
I would like to turn that advice around. “When you eat, meet.” That doesn’t work in as universal a way as Msgr. McGuinness’ advice, but I think it can apply to today’s subject. Next week we are going to have a special opportunity to eat. Next Sunday is our annual Parish Picnic at Fairhaven Park. I want to offer a special word of thanks to all who are contributing their talents and efforts to make this picnic a success. That goes particularly for the Pastoral Council, who are coordinating our efforts, and for the Knights of Columbus, who are taking care of the hamburgers and hot dogs (and other picnic food) with their usual flair. Having experienced these picnics on an annual basis, I am confident that this will be another rousing success. We will begin with Mass at 1:00 at the picnic grove. After Mass, in addition to the good food, there will be games for the kids and for the adults (with Sandy Vaught leading us in bingo). It should be fun for all.
But while we have good food and good fun, we also are planning this as a time to meet. This year we are opening the picnic to our partners in our new grouping of parishes. We have included an invitation to the people of St. John of God and Holy Trinity parishes to join us. As I write this, I don’t know what kind of response we may get, especially since I am writing well in advance. (I wanted to get a couple of August columns written before going on my vacation in July.) But I am hoping that quite a few of our new neighbors will join us. We are coming together as one community, and a good way to approach that goal is to come together in a social setting, with good food and good fun. It helps that we are also starting with Mass, as is our custom, so that we can remember that we are joining together through the most important source of unity we have, the Eucharist. In the informal setting of a picnic, that gathering can be a chance for us to share that Eucharist with one another.
The poet William Butler Yeats once said, “There are no strangers here; Only friends you haven’t yet met.” I hope we can keep that attitude as we move forward with the implementation of On Mission for the Church Alive. We have a common purpose of building the kingdom of God as we form this new grouping. And we have a common bond in the Eucharist that holds all Catholics together. We can obviously offer some very serious reflections on that idea. But when it comes down to daily life, we live that goal by forming friendships and enjoying one another’s company. One good way to reach that goal is to share together an afternoon of good food, fun and (I hope) sunshine. I like to think that Msgr. McGuinness (God rest his soul) would approve. He would remind us, “When you meet, eat.”
Father H
