St. Maria Goretti - Pastor's Note

This weekend we welcome all of our friends who join us for the 2008 St. Maria Goretti Italian Festival! We’re certainly very glad that you are here with us to continue to celebrate the Feast Day of our Patroness. Thank you for joining us this weekend. Months of preparation and hard work have gone into making this year’s Festival one of the biggest and best yet. I’d like to offer my sincerest thanks to Ben and Kristan Russell and Greg and Kim Stanley, for co-chairing this year’s event. Great job, guys! Thanks also to the hundreds, a record number in fact, of parishioners who volunteered time both before this weekend’s event, and during the Festival. Thanks you for the gift of yourself and your time.

We held the first Italian Festival in July of 1997, while still a Mission Parish of Our Lady of Mt. Carmel. Tom and Carla Erickson chaired the first event. The first Italian Festival was called “The 1997 St. Maria Goretti Italian Family Fun Festival”. I know, the title was a little long. Nobody had any idea how many people would come to an Italian summer Festival in Westfield, Indiana. I mean, Indiana is a state where most people think that Fazoli’s is “real” Italian. Would Westfieldians come out on a July evening for some Italian sausage and peppers and cannoli, to celebrate a young Catholic saint? An authentic Italian band was hired from Ohio. All kinds of children’s games were organized by Mark and Karen Hill for the event. The first Festival even had Bingo in the air-conditioned Parish Hall, so folks could beat the heat. It was such a beautiful evening that very few played Bingo. But everybody wanted to eat. We had planned for four-hundred people, hoping for a good initial turn out. More than nine-hundred people showed up! First, we ran out of tomato sauce, a mortal sin for any Italian Festival. Fr. Richard Doerr, the current Pastor of Our Lady of Mt. Carmel, and myself, went to Marsh at Village Park and bought literally every, single jar of tomato sauce that we could get our hands on. We brought it back to “doctor” it up. This is because even in Westfield, Indiana, you just can’t serve Spaghetti sauce out of a jar. My Italian ancestors would haunt me forever! Next, we ran out of breadsticks, and then cannoli, and finally pasta. With just fifteen minutes to go until we stopped serving food, the Westfield Fire Department showed up as our honored guests. I think we had some black olives left. A swift phone call was made to Domino’s to get enough pizza to feed the Fire Department, and the first Italian Festival went into the books as a success. What a wild time!

We’ve come a long way since 1997. The Italian Festival is my favorite evening of the entire year. I think I enjoy it so much because all of us work together to accomplish something fun for the entire community. Everybody helps out. This is further attested to by how many St. Maria Goretti families who have moved away, come back as often as they can for the Italian Festival. The Italian Festival has taught all of us a lot about being Church. What we found out is that putting on a big Italian festival is a whole lot like building the Kingdom of God. We’ve all got to help out. There’s a lot of work to be done. The Church is a lot bigger than what we might first think and everybody’s invited. Everybody’s got to get their hands dirty at some point. And maybe the most important thing we learned is how much fun it is, to work together as God’s people. My dear brothers and sisters, there is only ONE Church. We are all sons and daughters of God, brothers and sisters in our Faith, and it is imperative that WE work TOGETHER to build God’s Kingdom. It is so much more enjoyable when we “do” Church together. Can some pasta and gelato at an Italian Festival help us move towards that??? Absolutely! Just think of how many other bigger and greater things we can do together as Church! With God’s help, the possibilities are unlimited!

Not only do we need to give God a chance, we also need to give one another the chance to be Church, to be who God created us to be. We’re all still finding out more and more hopefully every day who that person is that God is calling us to be. We all want to get there ourselves. Wouldn’t it be a shame if we didn’t let somebody else get there too, all because of our preconceived notions and prejudices? God is not done with any of us. If He were, you would not be reading this right now. God is calling us together to be His Holy people, His Church. We can let God unite us and bring us together. Or, we can let the Devil tear us apart and continue to isolate us from one another. The choice is ours. The Italian Festival just proves how much fun it is to come together through Jesus Christ! St. Maria Goretti must be so happy looking down from Heaven. Hopefully, she’s saving a seat for each and every one of us, with enough cannoli for every one!

In Christ,

Fr. Kevin

When you’re in love, it shows!