Diocese of Fort Wayne-South Bend
St. Patrick Vietnamese community welcomes lunar new year
Verbite Father Chau Pham is shown with the Tree of Spring at St. Patrick Church, Fort Wayne, as Bishop John M. D'Arcy celebrated Mass with the Vietnamese population and welcomed the Lunar New Year of the Rat Feb. 3. The Tree of Spring is a decoration adorned with red envelopes with inspirational messages to guide people through the year ahead. (Photo by Greg Bastin)
By Lauren Caggiano
FORT WAYNE — St. Patrick Parish in Fort Wayne is a melting pot of cultures, and the Vietnamese lunar year celebration is an example of the changing face of Catholicism.
St. Patrick Parish, located at 2129 South Harrison St., caters to the Latino, Vietnamese and Anglo-American population in Fort Wayne’s south side neighborhood. Walking into the Lyceum building, the juxtaposition of cultures was evident. Signs in both Spanish and English welcomed visitors.
On this particular Sunday, Feb. 3, however, a sign reading “Hoi Cho Tet” on the sidewalk in front advertised the celebration of the Vietnamese Lunar New Year. Tet marks the beginning of a new year on the lunar calendar and the beginning of spring. The New Year begins on the first night of the first moon after the sun enters Aquarius. This is sometime between Jan. 21 and Feb. 19 on the solar calendar. Sunday’s festivities, organized by Father Chau Pham, pastor and a priest of the Society of the Divine Word, marked the beginning of the New Year for the Vietnamese community at St. Patrick’s.
“The Lunar New Year of the Rat of 2008 is the biggest and greatest celebration during the New Year to the Asian people and especially to the Vietnamese,” Father Pham wrote in a letter. “This is a time for all Vietnamese people to give their thanksgivings to God for what they have received from the past year and for what they will be granted in this new year.”
Inside the Lyceum, families enjoyed traditional Vietnamese cuisine, games and karaoke at an all-day celebration welcoming the New Year. The smell of crab ragoon, pork sandwiches and rice filled the air as Vietnamese women lured people with their dishes.
Following the festival, members of the community united for a 3:30 p.m. Mass in the church. The congregation was alive with a contagious energy; men and women donned traditional Vietnamese garb and chanted in their native tongue as incense permeated the church. A man banged a drum, signifying the start of the celebration of the Mass. According to Vietnamese tradition, a procession with three beats on a drum leads the people to the Spirit of God of the New Year.
Children carrying baskets of fruit and flowers led the entrance procession, as Bishop John M. D’Arcy followed behind wearing a traditional Vietnamese stoll. The priests bowed down three times in front of the altar, a Vietnamese tradition.
The Mass was truly a multicultural sacrament, celebrated in English and Vietnamese. Following the special reading for the New Year, Bishop D’Arcy addressed the congregation.
“This is a moment to hear the word of God,” he said about the Mass. “We need to thank God for our family ... our Vietnamese Catholic family.”
Bishop D’Arcy addressed the suffering and hardships of the Vietnamese-American community, many of whom “set out on a journey through an ocean of great fear.” But as he told them, they should find comfort in Jesus, because “the Gospel tells us he will always be with us.”
The bishop stressed the importance of sharing one’s faith. “You must hold (your faith) and tell it to your children,” he said. “You must preach it to others ... this strong faith. Faith is not something we hold within us.”
In closing, Bishop D’Arcy offered some words of admonishment. Don’t forget God, he said, and ask him to carry you into the future. “Never miss Mass and pay tribute to the one who protected you,” he said.
The celebration concluded with the bishop’s blessing of the Tree of Spring. The Tree of Spring is a decoration adorned with red envelopes with inspirational messages to guide people through the year ahead. Children and adults alike picked from the tree as the congregation watched in anticipation. The children were also presented with red envelopes, called “lucky money,” or li xi.
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