Southside parishes finalize merger

By GLEN ARGAN
WCR Editor
Edmonton

The parishioners of St. James Parish did not come empty handed when they finalized their long-planned merger with Assumption Parish on June 11, Pentecost Sunday.

Virtually everything that wasn't nailed down in the 50-year-old St. James Church made the trip to Assumption Church as 470 families of St. James became one with the 700 families at Assumption.

The merger was the first one finalized of several planned in the city of Edmonton under the November 1998 Faithful Into the Future report.

"We the people of St. James Parish come here freely and publicly state our desire to become one faith community with Assumption Parish," said Louise Lattimore, a St. James representative at the 10 a.m. Mass.

"We promise to work tirelessly for that unity of faith celebrated in the Church and in the sacraments."

The ritual was repeated at the two other weekend Masses as was a ceremony of St. James representatives presenting vestments and other liturgical artifacts to Assumption pastor Father Archibald MacKenzie.

MacKenzie told the congregation it is significant that the merger took place at Pentecost.

"Two thousand years ago, the disciples were scared, they were afraid," he said. Christ had sent them forth to preach the Gospel and they responded by huddling in a room.

But because the Holy Spirit has come, "we can never be afraid anymore," MacKenzie said.

Christ is still with us, he said. "He is here today in a special way with the joining together of two believing communities."

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