Yesterday I attended the 100th anniversary celebration of St. Thomas Apostle Parish in Washington, DC. The parish is home to the St. Philip Neri Oratory-in-Formation, headed by Msgr. Andrew Wadsworth, Executive Director of ICEL.
During his homily, Cardinal Wuerl spoke beautifully about the local parish as the place where the real work of the Church happens. Drawing from the prescribed second reading from the Acts of the Apostles for the Solemnity of Christ the King, he spoke about the four activities of the Church: communion, teaching, the Eucharist, and the prayers, and how these are embodied in the activities of the local parish.
The Pastor of St. Thomas Apostle, Fr. Richard Mullins, echoed the Cardinal’s homily in his closing remarks, using the words of Blessed Pope Paul VI.
The idea of the territorial parish is one of the beauties of canon law, assembling the entire surface of the globe as family units that form the terrestrial portion of the Kingdom.