PAGE 6 — The Georgia Bulletin, September 14, 1989
Our Lady Of Vietnam Mission Church Dedicated
VIETNAMESE MADONNA — Women from Our Lady of Vietnam
Mission carry a statue of Mary and a banner with the patroness of the
new church at the opening of a dedication Mass.
A CHILD SHALL LEAD — Children from the mission, dressed in
matching caps, kerchiefs and trousers, form an honor guard for the
Marian procession and entrance of priests.
BY GRETCHEN REISER
A celebration that began in mid-afternoon and lasted well
into the night with solemnity, followed by entertainment,
ushered in Our Lady of Vietnam Mission church.
Vietnamese Catholics in the archdiocese, who have been
striving since 1985 to have a church reflecting their culture,
hosted between 1,500 and 2,000 people for the dedication
Mass Sept. 3 and a supper and musical program afterward.
The sense of joy seemed as apparent as the wind that
tossed and curled rows of colored flags lining Thurman
Road in Forest Park, waving red and white for the Sacred
Heart, blue and white for the colors of Mary and yellow and
white for the papal insignia. Each person was greeted and
given a bilingual program and a lapel button imprinted
with the name of the church in Vietnamese and the image of
a madonna and child.
An outdoor altar that had been constructed, since the
crowd outnumbered the small brick church’s indoor
seating, was designed like a colorful pagoda with murals
showing the madonna against a background of the church
itself. The entrance procession, led by children in the mis
sion’s Eucharistic Youth Group dressed in matching,
brightly colored uniforms, was accompanied not by music
but a booming drum.
The people who came for Mass overflowed the shade of a
large yellow and white tent into extra seating on the lawn,
while priests from the archdiocese and visiting Vietnamese
priests from Louisiana, South Carolina, Nebraska,
Missouri, Virginia and Savannah, Ga., climbed green
carpeted steps to the altar where Archbishop Eugene A.
Marino, SSJ, celebrated the dedication Mass.
The formal ritual of blessing and dedicating a new church
and altar, in the context of a Mass, was carried out by Arch
bishop Marino, with cultural accents from the Vietnamese
tradition provided by the community.
Young women from the choir of Our Lady of Vietnam per
formed a graceful and slow liturgical dance, holding bou
quets of rosebuds which were offered to Mary as a symbolic
giving of hearts to her. Father Francis Pham Van Phuong
said this dance is one of several frequently used in Vietnam
and is similar to the May crowning of Mary with flowers so
common in American Catholic churches and schools.
The choir sang several hymns in Vietnamese during the
bilingual Mass. While Archbishop Marino walked from the
outdoor altar over to the church itself to bless and anoint it,
a string of fireworks was exploded, a cultural adaptation
that Father Francis said he had forewarned local police
about a bit ahead of time. “People believe the sounds will
dispel all the darkness, provide a good opening, a good
beginning,” he explained.
After the Mass, which lasted for over two hours, Viet
namese food prepared by the women of the community was
served to some 1,600 people, while the choir and members
of the congregation and Vietnamese entertainers sang,
danced and performed for the people still gathered on the
expansive lawn. A dance with Vietnamese singers was held
later that night at an Atlanta hotel to continue the celebra
tion. Awards were presented to several leaders who had
served with great sacrifice to make the new mission possi
ble.
The church, formerly the Forest Park Presbyterian
TRADITION OF BEAUTY — Fourteen young
women from the choir dance a Vietnamese “of-
Church, was purchased by the Vietnamese Catholic com
munity, with the aid of the archdiocese of Atlanta, in
March. They began celebrating Mass there during Holy
Week, but had waited to hold an appropriately complete
celebration until now. To pay for the purchase, the com
munity, under parish council president Bui Van Tam, had
raised approximately $200,000, including a $50,000 donation
from St. John the Evangelist parish in Hapeville, where
Vietnamese Catholics have worshipped until the mission
was established. An additional $100,000 was borrowed from
the archdiocese to pay for the church, but Father Francis,
who is administrator of the mission, said he believed the
community could pay back $50,000 of the loan already.
In his homily, which was translated into Vietnamese by
Father Francis, the archbishop spoke of the suffering of the
community, having to leave their homeland and so much
they cherished behind. The Vietnamese people, he said, are
known for their virtues of courage, perseverance, loyalty
and love of God and family. “Over the course of time,” he
said, “you have claimed a new country, a new birth, a new
fering of flowers” to the Blessed Mother as the
liturgy begins.
home. . . Today, this is a sign of God’s promise fulfilled.”
It is also a day of joy for the rest of the Church, he said,
because of the cultural richness the Vietnamese Catholics
will bring to the archdiocese and the community as a whole.
Such a mission devoted to Vietnamese Catholics is not
unique in the United States, said Father Peter Tran, who
works for the U.S. Catholic Conference in pastoral care to
migrants and refugees.
While various approaches are used in different arch
dioceses, he said the mission devoted to Vietnamese Catho
lics enables the community to reach out to other Viet
namese in evangelization and to reach out in reconciliation
to Vietnamese Catholics who may have left the church
when they encountered an American Catholic community
that seemed foreign or unwelcoming. Across the country,
he said, a concern is to bring back Vietnamese Catholics to
the church.
Masses at Our Lady of Vietnam are Saturday at 5 p.m.
and Sunday at 10 a.m.
