Bishop Jaime Soto will be the principal celebrant of a Mass on Friday, March 8 at 5:30 p.m. in St. Ignatius of Loyola Church (located at 3235 Arden Way in Sacramento), to mark the 70th anniversary of the parish.
He will be joined by former pastors of St. Ignatius Parish as concelebrants of the Mass.
As part of the anniversary celebration, the existing statue of Our Lady of Lourdes in the church's shrine of the Blessed Mother will be moved in a festive procession to St. Ignatius School on Thursday, March 7. On March 8 during the anniversary Mass, Bishop Soto will bless a renovated shrine of Our Lady of Guadalupe inside the church.
Jesuit Father Tom Lucas, pastor, designed the chapel. It's wall will be covered with blue Spanish tiles, and two hand-forged iron candle holders in the form of rose bushes, will flank a glass mosaic of the Mother of the Americas. Father Lucas, a stained glass artist, has hand-cut and set the mosaic image, comprised of almost 200 pieces of stained glass. Mary of those pieces have been fired to 1250 degrees Fahrenheit with vitreous paint. His work on the mosaic began shortly after Christmas.
Our Lady of Guadalupe is co-patroness of the Diocese of Sacramento. Father Lucas speaks of his devotion to the image that springs from summers of working with Mexican Franciscan Sisters at the Casa de los Pobres in Tijuana, B.C. "She promised to enfold us all in her mantle and to be mother of all in need," he said in a recent article in the parish bulletin.
The chapel renovation was made possible with funds raised several years ago by the parish's Altar Society. It celebrates the generosity of all who have cared for and adorned St. Ignatius Church with their offerings, temporal and spiritual.
The Society of Jesus (Jesuits) founded St. Ignatius Parish in 1954. Jesuit Father Fred Cosgrove as the founding pastor, who served until 1973. The parish has been a ministry of the Society of Jesus since it's founding and today serves approximately 3,000 families in the greater Sacramento area.
For more information about anniversary events, visit https://stignatiussac.org or call 916-482-9666.