Bishop Larry Silva blesses the new altar at St. Joseph Church in Waipahu with holy water Sept 18. (Photos by Dann Ebina)
By Patrick Downes
Hawaii Catholic Herald
In a rite rarely seen by Catholics, Bishop Larry Silva donned a white apron, rolled up his sleeves and poured the holy oil chrism onto the top of the new altar at St. Joseph Church in Waipahu, Sept. 18, and spread it over every inch of the surface with his bare hands.
The bishop pours the chrism on the altar.
The table on which Holy Eucharist is celebrated, the central action of the faith, requires such a solemn and special blessing.
Earlier in the ceremony, the altar servers had lifted off the top of the altar so that the bishop could place the altar’s relic stone within. The relics of saints imbedded in a marble slab represent the time in the early church when Mass was celebrated in the catacombs on the tombs of martyrs. The stone is from the church’s old altar.
After the anointing, the altar was wiped clean, engulfed in the sweet smoke of burning incense, dressed in white linen, flanked with candles and decorated with flowers. The liturgy then proceeded as usual.
Concelebrating were the pastor La Salette Father Efren Tomas and parochial vicars Father Eric Castro and Father Anton Nyo, also La Salette priests. Three deacons assisted.
According to St. Joseph office manager Mary Cachuela, her parish needed a new altar. Badly. An unholy host of termites had eaten through much of the base of the old one — manufactured by the Demetz Art Studio in Ortisei, a small village in northern Italy — and would soon make it unusable.
The bishop rubs the holy chrism across the top of the altar.
To find a new altar Father Tomas turned to a church supply catalog. Church Supply Warehouse of Wheaton, Illinois, a major supplier of Catholic church items from candles to vestments to statues, had dozens to choose from.
He chose item “DH-AL-SP01,” a handsome piece made of red oak, accented with columns of carved Celtic knotwork weaving its way up the corners, and a green marble strip around the top.
The altar’s dark cherry stain finish stands out in contrast to the lighter wood of the St. Joseph Church sanctuary.
Cachuela said the process of getting a new altar, from ordering to installation, took nine months, “like giving birth.”
The cost of the altar had not been figured in the parish budget, but a special fundraiser quickly took care of its $15,000 price tag.
Memories of the old altar with its carvings of Eucharistic imagery will be preserved in the matching tabernacle stand which the termites had spared, Cachuela said. The good wood from the old altar may be re-used for other decorative purposes.
Father Castro celebrated the last Mass on the old altar at 6:30 a.m., Wednesday, Sept. 18.
