PARISH KEEPS ITS PROMISE,

PARISHIONERS RESPOND AGAIN

            Akin to the popular film refrain, “If you build it, they will come,” the operative expression at St. John Vianney parish in Flushing appears to be, “You did what you said you’d do last year, so we’ll help you again this year.”

            That’s how one can describe parishioner response to the 2006 Annual Catholic Appeal after they saw the repainting and renovating of the church and parish center that took shape in the months since the 2005 drive. Then, as now, the parish exceeded its assigned goal, resulting in substantial over-goal funds returning to the parish for local needs.

            “I was surprised when we went over goal two years in a row,” said Father Brian Dowd, St. John Vianney’s pastor since 2000. “The direct appeal at all the Masses on Appeal Sunday was the key to success,” he said.

            That, and the fact that parishioners had seen the completion of the first part of the refurbishing and freshening up of the multi-purpose building, built in l973 to serve the youngest parish founded in Queens.

            This year’s over-goal funds---the parish received its first check amounting to $35,570---are sprucing up the religious education classrooms for the 150 youngsters who attend classes there in what Father Dowd calls “our small, intimate parish.”

The 2006 goal was $17,900, but parishioners more than quadrupled that in pledges, committing $84,433 to the appeal. If all the pledges are redeemed, the parish will gain $66,533.

New furniture for the five religious education classrooms will include sturdy wooden “prayer tables,” similar to credence tables, which will hold a Bible, a candle, a religious statue and a cloth in the appropriate color for each Church season.

“It’s a tradition for us to have a prayer table as a focal point in our classrooms,” Father Dowd said. “The teachers like it, and it’s a model of what we would encourage families to have at home.”

Contributing to the success of the Annual Catholic Appeal this year was the support from St. John Vianney’s Chinese community to which the largely Spanish- and English-speaking parish has had significant outreach in recent years. About 200 attend one of the two Chinese Masses on the weekend---Saturday evening in Cantonese and Sunday afternoon in Mandarin.

As a sign of how the parish has bonded the multi-ethnic parishioners, Father Dowd said he expected 500 for the Chinese New Year Mass in January, but over 600 parishioners came. “About a hundred had to stand.”

While he regrets that he is unable to speak any of the Chinese dialects, the pastor said he had learned a few words. “I can give out Communion in Chinese,” he acknowledged.

“The appeal went so well last year,” he said, and when the parish saw that the pastor’s statement of how the funds would be used “was done as we said it would be done,” the response was a unified “Yes” to the 2006 appeal.

Meanwhile, another event will draw parishioners together when Father Dowd leads about three dozen who will venerate the “incorrupt” heart of St. John Vianney, the patron saint of parish priests, at Cure of Ars Church in Merrick, L.I., on Tuesday, Oct. 10. Bishop Nicholas DiMarzio will celebrate Mass at 12:30 p.m.

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10/4/06