“Father Julian lives stewardship and leads through his actions.”
Those words spoken by Ethel Dulak with the Diocese Office of Parish Stewardship most succinctly describes the resurgence at Our Lady of Guadalupe in Alice under the leadership of Father Julian Cabrera.
“He has made sure there is something for everyone,” Dulak said.
As a result, there has been a big surge in youth activities, Mass attendance and collections and the recent Legacy of Faith~Future of Hope campaign exceeded all expectations.
Father Cabrera modestly shrugs off the compliment. The parish was in good shape when he got there and any revival is due to many factors; most importantly to parishioners themselves.
“I try to meet them where they’re at, to bring them to where they should be,” Father Cabrera said.
Where they are at is in Rancho Alegre, historically one of the poorest sections of Alice. In fact, the area started as a colonia and the city has never seen fit to incorporate them. Still, like any colonia dweller, residents in the area exude the self-determination of people who value the idea of homeownership, which is what brought them to the area in the first place.
By 1964, the area had about 600 families, most of them Catholic. Father Javier Caldeano, O.P., pastor at St. Joseph Parish purchased three acres of land and bought an old schoolhouse to serve as a church. Father Caldeano reported to Bishop Thomas J. Drury that the church had seating for 300 and—much like today—on Sundays it was filled to capacity.
“The good people of the Mission are working very hard with bingos, raffles, barbecues, door-to-door campaigns, etc., in order to raise money with the hope of someday in the near future to have their own church erected,” Father Caldeano wrote the bishop in February 1967.
A little over a year later, in March 1968, Bishop Drury agreed to have a church built for the Mission of Our Lady of Guadalupe at a cost of $87,874, with the diocese providing $50,000. On May 1, 1970, Bishop Drury elevated the mission to a parish.
More than 40 years later, Our Lady of Guadalupe continues as a vibrant parish. Once a mission itself, today it oversees Santo Nino de Atocha Mission in Tecolote. But it is not without challenges.
The parish is carrying a note of $600,000 and the parking lot is “holier” than the church. Father Cabrera and parishioners are taking on these challenges head on. With the help of the Office of Parish Stewardship they received pledges of $808,000 for the Legacy of Faith~Future of Hope campaign, exceeding their goal of $300,000 by more than 200 percent.
Father Cabrera has been making one-and-a-half monthly payments on the note, and will use collections from the Legacy of Faith~Future of Hope to pay off the debt. As for the potholes, the parish will use the nearly $100,000 they made in their recent parish festival to pave the parking lot.
“People have been extremely generous,” Father Cabrera said.
The debt and improvements to the physical plant, while challenging, are clear targets and less difficult to attack. The spiritual and pastoral needs of the parish are harder to tackle; harder, but not impossible.
Father Cabrera was born in Falfurrias, a mere 30 miles south of Rancho Alegre. He tells parishioners he understands their problems because he grew up in a community very much like their own. He shares their hardscrabble life experiences, their family structures, their cultural customs and their social justice issues.
Part of what has happened, Father Cabrera said, is the people have changed their self-image and internalized the racism directed at them. “I tell them ‘don’t think of yourselves as others see you’,” Father Cabrera said.
“The general consensus is always the little church in the barrio, but it really isn’t. It’s been healthy for a number of years. I keep telling them ‘we are already the church that God is calling us to be.’ We just haven’t realized it.”
A large part of Father Cabrera’s success is his caring approach. “It’s easy to tell them ‘too bad’, it’s harder to take the time to talk with them about their situation,” Father Cabrera said.
“Even in tribulation, God sends us blessings,” he told the congregation in his homily at a recent Sunday Mass.
The pastor’s approach was evident that Sunday. The church was filled to capacity. The crying room was jam-packed. People were standing in the rear of the church and on the side isles.
He said that he had a responsibility to those coming for a blessing during Holy Communion, to “invite you and bring you into the Eucharist.”
“We come here to be fed so we can go out into the world to give witness to the communion of the Holy Trinity,” Father Cabrera said.
After the Mass, between handshakes, hugs and high fives, he blessed a man who was scheduled for surgery and a medallion for an elderly woman. After greeting people, he counseled a woman in an “irregular marriage” to enter into a Sacramental marriage even if her husband did not want to become Catholic, so that she could receive the Eucharist.
Later that day, while having lunch at a nearby restaurant, Father Cabrera remained engaged with his parishioners. A waiter approached him about starting a Spanish Mass. Father Cabrera told the young man to encourage his friends to volunteer as Eucharistic ministers and readers and he would start the Mass.
A waitress came over to talk to the priest about her recent health issues. A bus boy confessed freely and openly to not having attended Mass for more than a year but promised to return. People in adjoining tables engaged Father Cabrera about other problems, and he ministered to them all.
Ministering to his flock is Father Cabrera’s focus. He visits the sick, blesses homes, performs funeral services and gives last rites to the dying. Before coming to Our Lady of Guadalupe he assisted Msgr. Louis Kihneman, Vicar General, at Sacred Heart in Rockport. Father Cabrera values his training under Msgr. Kihneman and often asks himself “what would monsignor do?”
Part of the trick, Father Cabrera said, is to find a balance. “People want to be acknowledged but you don’t want the Church just to be a social outlet, the Church has more to give than that,” he said. “But you use whatever you have to bring them in.”
“People are really hungry, but they are struggling and so I try to be as welcoming as possible,” Father Cabrera said. “One of my goals when I got ordained was that I wanted people to see God in the ordinary, in the everyday life.”