Cathedral of the Epiphany celebrates diversity

By JULIE KEANE, Globe staff reporter
February 26, 2004

The Cathedral of the Epiphany hosted a cultural fair last Sunday to celebrate diversity within the parish by having assorted ethnic food, entertainment and games for those who attended.

"It was really fun to see everyone in the same room having prepared their food, entertainment and having invited not only the parishioner but guests to come," said Sister Barbara Knipp, pastoral Hispanic minister at Cathedral of the Epiphany. "It's nice to see people proud of their culture and have the opportunity to share that with other people."

Sister Barbara said that the Cathedral hosts this event each year to help bring together the three cultures of the parish - Vietnamese, Hispanic and Anglo. The cultural fair also tries to include the historical culture of the church by including Irish and German foods. She said they also invited Native Americans to participate in the fair.

"The culture fair has been something that we have done year after year here at the Cathedral for two purposes: The first one is to celebrate our diversity and to see that as a great gift we have to offer not only the parish but the community and the second is for a fundraiser for the Cathedral of the Epiphany for our programs."

The cultural fair was open to public and cost $5 to participate. The $5 bought a booklet of tickets, which was used for the purchasing of different ethnic foods and also allowed children to participate in different games.

"We celebrated mainly through food," Sister Barbara said. "We had six booths this year - German, Vietnamese, Italian, Native American, Mexican and then we had a huge dessert table. We had entertainment from the Anglo, Vietnamese and Latino cultures, which went on throughout the whole day."

The food was prepared on Saturday and Sunday by Cathedral parishioners. Each culture prepared their own food in the cafeteria together. Fred Garber, who was in charge of the event, said this was another way that the different communities worked together during the cultural fair.

"I like to see all of the people of the parish coming together for one project," Garber said. "We have many cultures with many different languages. The Vietnamese, Hispanic and English all come together for one common goal. They all come together and helped each other."

Garber said that he hopes next year there will be more participating and new booths available.

"Every year it is a little bit different," Garber said. "I talked to an individual who is interested in doing an African-American booth for next year. We are also tossing around the idea of having United States food there."

Sister Barbara said that she thought the cultural fair was well received by all who attended.

"I think that everyone who came had a good time," Sister Barbara said. "It was a nice celebration and is something that we hope to continue. We hope each year it gets bigger and bigger."