Today I had the chance to visit the parish of Saint Suzanne in Pierrefonds East. This visit was part of the tour of parishes I began shortly after being ordained a bishop. Regular readers may recall that, as I was preparing for the ordination, I had felt a call to visit the parishes that had been an important part of my faith and vocational journey. Saint Suzanne was certainly one such place: this was my parish in Montreal when I was growing up, up until I became a teenager and my family moved a bit further west. I attended the Catholic elementary school across the street; had my first communion and my confirmation in this parish; used to bike to the Bible day camp during the summer; was an altar server and lector; got to know the very first priest who I considered not just a pastor but a friend; and finally, got to know some of the universal dimension of the Church, as this was a bilingual (English-French) parish.
Thinking about it, that last point is kind of interesting, actually. My home parish used two languages, and when we would visit family in Ottawa we’d pray in German, so it just made sense to me growing up that the Catholic religion, while embracing and enhancing culture, was bigger than whatever tribe we were a part of. I don’t know that I would have ever articulated it this way, but I know I felt it, as part of one of my child-like assumptions about God and life. It was part of my lived experience, and I am very grateful that divine providence blessed me with that chance.
I had a chance to run into some old neighbours who I had not seen in decades — it was quite the trip down memory lane. It’s a funny thing: I could have sworn the parish church was bigger than it actually is. I guess I was just that much smaller. The current pastor, Father Gagné, was very generous in his welcome to me, and told me that I should feel like I was home. But I was way ahead of him. :-)
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