TRR photo by Krista Gromalski Fr. Urrutigoity examining one of God’s creatures with young Paul Bond. (Click for larger image)

The birth of a new Christendom in Shohola

By KRISTA GROMALSKI

SHOHOLA — Seeds are being sown in Shohola. The Catholic Church of tomorrow is being planted by the Society of Saint John on 1,000 acres just off  Route 434.

Fr. Carlos Urrutigoity, superior general of the society, a recently formed order of priests and clerics, calls this mission “one holistic proposition.”

Urrutigoity envisions a community centered around the altar. “What is at the core of Christianity is the sacrifice of the mass, and it is around the liturgy that we could create schools, housing... an entire lifestyle,” he said.

“Instead of being at odds with the church it would be in harmony.”

	TRR photo by Krista Gromalski Jeff Bond, coordinator for the college to be known as the College of Saint Justin the Martyr, surveying the location where the city will be built. (Click for larger image)

The Society of Saint John was officially formed in May 1998 with canonical approval from Bishop James Timlin of the Diocese of Scranton. Prior to this step, Urrutigoity and the group saw a need for the restoration of “mystery and the splendor of Christ.”

The order purchased their Shohola property for $2.9 million from previous owner Don Ziccardi in September 1999. “We didn’t have the money at all,” said Urrutigoity, but the society was able to fund its purchase with financial gifts from Ziccardi and an anonymous benefactor, as well as a Penn Security Bank loan.

With this purchase the work began. “We thought, how can we take all of the issues at once... providing not only a beautiful liturgy, but also good schools, a good environment...  he said. In answer to this, the society proposes to use principles of liturgy, priesthood, education and community as stepping stones to a larger plan which includes a college and eventually a renewed Christian society taking the form of a small city.

	TRR photo by Krista Gromalski Fr. Urrutigoity consecrating the Eucharist at the chapel altar. (Click for larger image)

This ambitious endeavor has been honed into a three-stage process. First, the society plans to establish offices and a library by extending an existing lodge on the property into a series of buildings. “That would allow the college to get into operation,” according to Jeff Bond, coordinator for the college to be known as the College of Saint Justin the Martyr.

Bond said the institution will be in the tradition of “the great books schools.” Students will study philosophy directly from the writings of the great philosophers such as Plato and Aristotle rather than reading textbooks. “When you read those books, you see the mind reaching out as far as it can go,” he said.

Subjects will include the classical languages of Greek, Latin and Hebrew as well as the liberal arts of grammar, logic, geometry and music. Bond is currently organizing the program of studies for the four-year liberal arts college, stating, “My concern right now has primarily been the curriculum and faculty.”

So far, the proposed 146-acre college has attracted the attention of professor Nestor Sequeiros, who instructed Fr. Urrutigoity at Our Lady of Co-Redemption Seminary in Argentina. Sequeiros will teach Greek and Latin this fall to postulates and members of the society. Eventually the college will open its doors to women and men of the lay community but there is no official date set for that, said Bond.

During the second phase of its plan the society hopes to construct a small prototype of the proposed community; this version will include a retreat center, a friary and, of course, a chapel. “The prototype would be a way to do it on a smaller scale and to learn from the challenges that are going to arise,” said Bond.

The final phase of the project will be the creation of the community on a larger scale which, Bond said, is to be “a city more in the medieval sense of being a place where there’s a certain self-sufficiency among the people there where they live and work and pray.”

	TRR photo by Krista Gromalski Members of Oblates of Mary Queen of the Apostles, above, chant the Latin liturgy on Pentecost Sunday. (Click for larger image)

Word of the plans for this community has spread since the society purchased the land in 1999, prompting interested individuals from as far away as Tennessee to make the pilgrimage to the grounds in hopes of becoming a part of the community. No facilities exist yet for permanent housing but Bond said he has witnessed a few mornings where families have set up camp on the lawn. People already involved with the community have also begun to purchase homes in the area, he added.

At the center of the plan is the daily celebration of the traditional Latin mass, a practice that is part of “a renewal of faith through a return to the sources of that faith,” according to the society. “The Latin mass is the mass that created Christendom,” Bond said. “Everything flowed from the altar.”

In keeping with this, the community's main feature will be a chapel at the town square. For now, the liturgy is celebrated in a converted horse stable where the atmosphere is one of reverence and intimacy, reflecting the society’s ultimate goals.

Urrutigoity sees the construction of a city as a way of addressing the concerns of modern Catholics as well as society as a whole. “Something that interests our generation is the relationship between technology and ecology. So we thought that the church could provide a good model of a housing development that would be highly ecological, respectful of nature and very beautiful at the same time,” he said. “This is a very holistic approach, from liturgy to ecology to sociology to schools. And we don’t pretend to be the only right thing to do, but just to provide a model ... so that we can all help each other.”

In essence, the society is attempting to begin a new era of Christianity by recreating many of the same conditions that existed naturally during the original formation of the Church. As Bond put it, “To look at the things that created civilization and Christendom in the first place and then to go back with the belief that if it happened once it can happen again.”

The scope of this project is vast and as leader of the society, Urrutigoity can see beyond his idealism. “To actually do this could take many generations or it could take a few years... he said. “Things really depend on God’s providence.”

The Society of Saint John offers mass each Sunday at 10:00 a.m. and the public is welcome to attend. For more information visit www.ssjohn.org, or call 570/685-5151.