Google Earth Pictorial: St. Damians
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 “So where do you do you call home?” Curt asked me that tonight. And I didn’t know how to answer. Where is home? Chicago? Collinsville? Some place else? It reminds me of one of my favorite quotes by John Updike, “Home is found in the leaving.” The way we know where home is often happens because we depart.  

I thought of a similar question as I approached Damiansville, IL today. The which preoccupied my thoughts was “Where am I from?” It is an interesting question for all of us. “Where are you from?” 

For example. Someone who is Jewish. How might they answer the question? It might look something like this. “I’m from Los Angeles, but came from St. Louis. Bur I’m from Germany, which is where my parents lived before the Holocaust. But we are Jewish, so really I’m from Israel… that is before the Diaspora. But then again, we’re Jewish, so really we came from Egypt where we were slaves.” 

It seems that Jesus would have had the same problem in answering the same question. “Well I’m from Galilee. But I’m a Nazarene, but then again, I’m from Bethlehem.” (for non-scripture scholars, these are actually different places and references.) 

We are from many different places. I’m from Chicago, also I’m from Collinsville. I’m a descendant of Germans. So am I from Germany? In a way, I guess. But I’m also an American. Most important today’s church visit, I’m from a people who live in Clinton County, specifically in Damiansville, IL.  

Today, I walked into old shed that holds knick knacks that m family stores on a small piece of ground where we would recreate during the summer. We would come out and see our relatives, plant potatoes and tomatoes, eat fresh watermelon, and mellow in the afterglow of an evening bonfire. There was no electricity in this haven away from suburban life. I learned to ride a bike on this land. It was here where I felt the rush of the cool twilight tickle my ears as I soared around the grounds on two wheels for the first time. I learned to play cards on this land as I passed the days waiting for the summer wheat turn a golden brown. I captured grasshoppers and bumblebees in playful carelessness, while my parents chastised me for not digging potatoes. 

As a family, we laughed here. We laughed over dogs who would steal the evening’s supper and firework displays that took unexpected turns, igniting all at once, leaving aunts and uncles dodging bottle rockets and roman candles which erupted in unplanned excitement.  

Damiansville is a one road town in Clinton County, Illinois. The 30 mile per hour speed limit sign as you enter the town is the speed limit you will need to know for the entire one mile stretch. This is where my parents grew up and where my roots are from. I walked into the graveyard where the names for over a hundred years remain the same as the names you see today, Heimann, Hellmann, Toennies, and Fuehne. My grandparents are buried here.  

I visited the church which gives the name of the town, St. Damian. This small parish serves this Illinois homestead of almost exclusive German heritage. My parents were married here in this church. They attended daily mass here. Every summer we would come back here and reunite with the community at their annual picnic where even to this day, handmade quilts are the top prize for bingo.  

Two things surprised me in this remote town. First, there is now an active ministry to Spanish speaking persons. There is a local nursery which hires a great number of immigrants from Mexico. Now they come to this parish for Mass in Spanish. At the same time, the windows are inscribed with German memorials dedicating the windows to donors who made this church possible. “Andenken an die Verstarbenen der famile __________” 

This irony was heightened by the fact that, for the first time, I found my last name on one of these windows. The widow dedicated to King St. Henirick (a patron of mine by my middle name) was actually given in the memory of my great grandmother, Maria Heimann. So when someone asks me where I’m from, I know that I have to include this church, this village, these people. My uncle said today, “Things don’t change much around here; if they do it takes a long time.” I felt that was a paradigm for two things, the Church and home.

The Church is constant and steady. It changes, but makes those changes organically, over centuries, not weeks or years. Because of this, the Church is something to which we can always return. It is dependable. It feels like a home. And of course home feels like home for the same reason. No matter how many times you leave, when you come back, it feels like the same nourishing oasis that it always was and always is.  I’ve been a little indulgent tonight about my own experiences in this blog, but there is a reason why I am doing this. I will write about it more in future days. I’m discovering the importance of taking personal account of one’s life when engaging on spiritual journey. I hope that my remarks will propel you to spend some time reflecting on your own personal experiences and think about where you are from. 

If you have loaded Google Earth onto your computer, you can view my pictorial of St. Damian’s parish by clicking here. There are some other folders of pictures that will load up in your Google Earth browser. These are links that will bring you to the places I grew up, renewed today in my memory by my walking through the same grass, playing cards, and sharing a warming meal with the family that makes the country life in Illinois part of my roots, part of where I’m from.