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Health & Fitness

Sacred Heart Church to Celebrate 10th Anniversary

This Sunday, you are invited to help celebrate the 10th anniversary of our church building at Sacred Heart Church in Eureka.

I was baptized at the frame church on Central Avenue in 1925 and records show my godfather was my Uncle George from whom I got my name George. My godmother was Dorothy Franz, whose family owned the farm where is located, and I later farmed it.

was part of my life as I served as an altar boy and sang in the choir under Fr. Daniel Dowling.

In 1947, I came to church one Sunday hoping to talk to him about my upcoming marriage to Roberta, and instead of him, a stranger to me got out of the car and I had to introduce myself to a Franciscan Father Walfrid, who had been appointed the first priest of our new parish. He made our home his center of influence while he gave my bride-to-be the instructions into her new church, and then performed the first wedding in the new parish.

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Time has passed. This Sunday I looked in the bulletin and read:

Church Anniversary Celebration

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You are invited to join fellow parishioners of the 10th Anniversary Celebration of the Dedication of our church on Sunday, July 24, 2011, in Fr. Dowling Hall following the 11 a.m. Mass. The Knights of Columbus will barbecue, and there will be a balloon release and face painting for the children of the parish.

Roberta, my wife of 54 years, became a booster and helper of the parish. Suddenly just about three weeks after Archbishop Justin Rigali made a pastoral visit to our parish to dedicate our new church building, Roberta died and became the first funeral memorial service in the new church, with her memorial visit set up in this same Fr. Dowling Hall. We no funeral, as she had given her body to St. Louis University Hospital, as I have also.

As Fr. Schilli, our pastor, said in the bulletin message in announcing this event, "This will be the Mass for the Anniversary of the Dedication of a Church. Because a church building is the center of the prayer life of a parish community, I
thought this would be an appropriate way to honor the generosity and hard work
of the past decade in building this place of worship. We must thank God for this
place of worship."

So, I thank all the others in the parish, both long timers or those who are new to our area, for their actions. We will not allow this peak moment to go unnoticed.

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