On October 6, the Holy Rosary parish of Tomsk celebrated its feast day with great fanfare and a weekend of celebrations.  The festivities began on Saturday with a lunch for the area’s religious and community leaders, including local Orthodox and Protestant priests and ministers.  During the week leading up to the feast, the church hosted a small parish mission reflecting on the true meaning of the rosary.  Pilgrims from around the region also arrived that Saturday to participate in mass and the season’s last outside rosary procession before the onset of winter.

On Sunday, after the main mass, the diocese’s vicar general, accompanied by the region’s Jesuit provincial, Boguslaw Steczek, blessed the parish house.  While this blessing marked the official opening of the new house, it has increasingly become “home” to more and more parishioners and church groups over the past several months.  A sure sign of the increasing use of the house was evident during the week leading up to the feast.  Each day, the house was full of activity as the people of the parish came together to cook, decorate, and offer their talents and gifts, all in the name of bringing people together as church in Tomsk.  Yet more evidence of the parish house’s centrality to the church community was the celebration of the Russian “Day for the Elderly” earlier that week.  The church put on another small feast and hosted members of the older generations to a joyful day of food, singing, and dancing.  Many of the parish “grandmothers” remarked that the occasion was something very special for them.  Of course, the efforts of the parish’s people are responsible for all of this, but the newfound joy and additional festivities have certainly been facilitated by the new parish building as well.

The Holy Rosary parish has been served by the Society of Jesus for the past five years.  Currently the Jesuit community in Tomsk consists of two Polish priests, an American priest, and an American regent.  In addition to the parish, the works of the Jesuits there include serving the people in the villages of the surrounding region, offering spiritual direction, and teaching in and supporting the parish school.  This school is the only Catholic school in Russia.