When Pope Francis celebrates Mass at Edmonton’s Commonwealth Stadium July 26, British Columbia will be well represented.
Archbishop J. Michael Miller will be at the Mass with other bishops to concelebrate with the Pope, while several seminarians from the Seminary of Christ the King in Mission will serve at the liturgy.
Chancellor Barbara Dowding will be among the Vancouver faithful, clergy, and religious attending the papal Mass, which some local Catholics were still trying to snag tickets to a week before the Pope’s arrival in Canada.
- Father Cristino Bouvette is working with Vancouver priest Father Pablo Santa Maria on the liturgy at the papal Mass in Edmonton. (Yuan Wang, CCN)
Meanwhile the liturgy itself will reflect local First Nations contributions.
Father Pablo Santa Maria of Holy Rosary Cathedral will serve at the papal Mass, assisting Father Cristino Bouvette, vocations director for the Archdiocese of Edmonton, who is responsible for liturgies during the visit.
Father Santa Maria is not only helping with liturgical logistics, but he also has a hand in the vestments the Pope will be wearing.
Commonwealth Stadium in Edmonton, where Pope Francis will celebrate Mass July 26. (CNS photo/Erich Schlegel-USA TODAY Sports via Reuters)
Father Santa Maria has been working with two Indigenous women, Susan Hauck and Julia Kozak, to design and produce the vestments that the Pope will wear at Commonwealth Stadium.
Kozak is part of the organizing committee for the papal visit and is a member of the Nisga’a First Nation in northwestern B.C. A talented pow wow dancer, Kozak makes her own regalia and is making the beadwork and designs that will be incorporated into the Pope’s vestments and mitre.
Hauck, who is well known around the archdiocese for her tireless promotion of the devotion to the Infant of Prague, is an experienced seamstress.
