A Joyful Church Reopening After Arson

A year after arson destroyed part of St. Justin Martyr Catholic Church in Anaheim, the church reopened Thursday evening with a candlelight celebration that included Bishop Tod D. Brown, harp music and fragrant plumes of incense.

“I’ll probably need a whole box of Kleenex beside me tonight,” Father Joseph Nettekoven, the church’s pastor, said before the consecration Mass began. The church underwent nearly $2 million in renovations.

Brown led the ceremony, anointing the altar and walls with holy oil for the first time in the building’s 47-year history. Parishioners then ceremoniously lighted the four permanently mounted dedication candles and the lights of the church were turned on.

“Out of the wreckage and ashes of that terrible event has arisen a beautiful church building,” the bishop told the standing-room-only crowd of about 1,000. “After [nearly] 50 years you finally have a church; everyone has a right to be proud.”

Such rites had never been performed before because the red-brick structure wasn’t supposed to be St. Justin Martyr’s permanent sanctuary, Nettekoven said.

Opened in 1959, the edifice was intended to become the parish hall after a separate church building was to be constructed nearby. But those plans never materialized.

St. Justin Martyr’s founding pastor, Msgr. Hugh O’Connor, now 91 and retired, flew in from Ireland this week to take part in Thursday’s ceremony.

Also on hand were several of the Anaheim firefighters who doused last year’s blaze and rescued some of the church’s artwork. They arrived via a firetruck, which remained parked outside.

Since July 2005, the congregation has been worshiping inside a large white tent behind the church, where damage totaled about $1 million.

“It was like an old-time revival,” Nettekoven said. “It was an adventure, and it was a challenge. Well, it was mostly a challenge.”

When the first rainstorm hit, water rushed by everyone’s feet during Mass, he recalled. A raised wooden floor was soon built.

The situation also crimped church programs to feed the needy and provide meeting space for scout troops and other outside groups.

“This tightly knit community has endured a great deal of hardship over the past year,” Brown said in a prepared statement issued before the church reopened. “I am truly inspired by our parishioners’ perseverance in the face of adversity and their lack of animosity toward those who committed this act.”

The fire, which remains unsolved, caused extensive damage to the choir loft and rear of the church.

As part of the renovation, church officials spent another $1 million on earthquake retrofitting, handicapped access, an alarm system and a replica of Bernini’s 17th century Holy Spirit window at St. Peter’s Basilica in Rome, Nettekoven said.

Insurance covered the fire damage, and donations have brought in nearly $750,000 for other improvements, he said.