New Immigrants, Same Church
by Carine Hajjar

Published in The Wall Street Jounral on Thursday December 22, 2022

New Immigrants, the Same Church - WSJ

The drizzly trudge through Tompkins Square Park was worth it for the destination: Saint Brigid-Saint Emeric's Parish. The church is warmly colored with bright murals around the altar. Its community is warm, too. The pews are full of congregants, the aisles full of ushers and volunteers. 

This particular Sunday, the church was ablaze. A mariachi band replaced the usual lone cantor. Bright strings of lights and dozens of red and yellow roses adorned a statue on the altar. It was the Virgin of Guadalupe.

Standing at the lectern, the young priest faced his congregation. He started his homily with enthusiasm: "Vive la Virgen de Guadalupe!" -long live the Virgin of Gudalupe! The congregation reciprocated: "Que Vive!"

I grew up speaking Spanish with my mother and chose the community as my spiritual home when I moved to the city. The congregation is predominantly Puerto Rican and Dominican with substantial Peruvian and Mexican communities. 

Father Sean Connolly, 34, told the story of the Virgin of Guadalupe, whose feast day was Dec. 12.In Spanish he explained how she appeared to Juan Diego, an Aztec convert to Catholicism, in 1531 near Mexico City. As proof to the city's bishop, Huan collected a cloakful of roses that grew where the Virgin had appeared, though it was winter. When he emptied them out, his Aztec tilma was emblazoned with her image.

Father Connolly retold parts in an English that was unmistakably New Yorker. Born in northern Westchester County, he had to take weekly Spanish classes during his five years at Saint Joseph's Seminary in Yonkers, mandated by the Cardinal Timothy Dolan, archbishop of New York, to accommodate the diocese's growing Hispanic population.

Father Connolly speaks Spanish formally - the way you learn in school. "I still have much to learn," he said in an interview a few days after the service. But what he lacks in fluidity he compensates for in sincerity. His congregants listen intently, faithfully.

He concluded the homily by explaining that the Virgin's apparition completed the Catholic Church. It was no longer a faith of the Old World, but a new one for a new civilization. This universality would become its greatest strength. "All nations and races are united by their baptism", he told me. These different cultures have developed unique and beautiful ways to express our common faith."

After the homily, a woman came up to make the weekly announcements: the book club, a social gathering, a luncheon. Then she called up a member of the Confraternidad del Senor de los Milagros, a devotional group of Peruvian men who minister at Mass in their long, purple robes. The man carried a medal. In Spanish he said that the Confraternidad would like to induct Father Connolly as its spiritual director. He thanked the priest for his service to their community and bestowed the medal on him. The congregation erupted in applause.

Father Connolly, with a bashful smile, took to the lectern with his medal to finish the Mass. He started to thank the congregation in Spanish, but moved with humble gratitude, stumbled searching for the right words. A few older women in the pews piously nodded, signaling that they completely understood.

He told a story in English. HIs great-grandfather Thomas Connolly, like many of the present congregants, was an immigrant to New York. Arriving in 1849, he likely would have worshipped at St. Brigid's, which was built by Irish immigrants in 1848. It later combined with St. Emeric's, which was founded by Hungarian immigrants.

When he finished, the church erupted in applause. The mariachis played and Father Connolly again called out: "Que vive la Virgen de Guadalupe!" 

"Que Vive!" his flock responded. I walked outside and waited to see the congregation process through the drizzle as one church.