HCH photo by Anna Weaver

Heads bowed, Hawaii government officials receive the congregation’s blessing at the Red Mass, Jan. 17, in the Cathedral of Our Lady of Peace.

The impact of the Red Mass begins a half hour before the opening procession, on the expanse of Fort Street Mall in front of the cathedral, as the bishop, priests and deacons mingle with members of Hawaiian royal orders, government officials, leaders of other faiths, diocesan church leaders, the media, and members of the faithful.

The annual outdoor ritual of handshakes and kisses, lei greeting and photo-taking stirs up plenty of aloha — an appropriate preparation for what soon will happen inside the church, a formal prayer asking the Holy Spirit to shower wisdom and strength upon Hawaii’s public servants.

Bishop Larry Silva presided at the Mass in the Cathedral of Our Lady of Peace, Thursday morning, Jan. 17, the day after the opening of the state legislature.

Governor Linda Lingle was there, standing out among other dark suited officials in her appropriately bright red jacket.

The guest speaker was Immaculee Ilibagiza, an African genocide survivor and author, who had just completed a string of talks in Hawaii. (See story below.)

Maui Mayor Charmaine Tavares was also present among the legislators, Hawaii Supreme Court justice, city council members and other officials who lined the front pews left and right of the altar.

In his homily, Bishop Silva sought to inspire fresh expectations of the public liturgy that has been an annual ritual in Hawaii since 1955.

“Here we are again,” the bishop started, speaking after the Gospel, before listing a string of society’s thorny, unrelenting problems from homelessness to abortion.

While the best efforts of those here “will only cause a ripple in the vast ocean of needs,” he said, “we have hope.”

That is why “we are here again,” he repeated.

“We thank God for the gift of hope planted in our hearts,” the bishop said.

“They have taken upon themselves a burden,” Bishop Silva said of the public officials present, paraphrasing Matthew’s Gospel. “They have taken upon themselves a yoke upon their shoulders.”

“They are here — comforted and supported by Christ’s body, the church … aware of the great things that can be accomplished with hope,” he said.

“Here we are again,” the bishop said a third time, “filled with great hope. We believe that God will make all things work for good for those who love him.”

Twenty priests and 10 deacons participated in the liturgy which included a few traditional touches with the Gloria and Lamb of God sung in Latin Gregorian chant and the bishop using a tall ornate antique chalice.

The vestments and stoles were red for a Mass of the Holy Spirit. The hymns, from the opening “Hawaii Ponoi,” were a mix of old, new, Hawaiian and patriotic.

About 400 people attended, the overflow settling into the balconies overhead.

After Communion, Ilibagiza spoke for 15 minutes about her amazing transformation from a terrified and angry woman in hiding who escaped death by inches during the horrific Rwandan genocide of 1994, to someone who embraced and offered forgiveness, even to the person who slaughtered her family and had hoped to murder her.

Dressed in a traditional Rwandan dress of shimmering deep pink fabric with purple and orange accents, she described huddling for three months with seven other women in 3-by-4 foot bathroom, questioning God’s existence, and resorting to the last gift given to her by her father, a rosary.

“I prayed the rosary,” she said, “I mediated on the life of Jesus.”

While gazing at the rosary’s crucifix, she found her redemption in the words and example of the dying Jesus, “Father, forgive them, for they don’t know what they do.”

“My pain of self pity lifted,” she said, and she knew she had to make a choice, between hate and love.

To choose hate, she realized, was to “belong to the killers.” She decided there and then to choose love.

Though she only weighed 65 pounds when she eventually found safety, “somehow, in my heart, I was much stronger,” Ilibagiza said.

Even when she discovered that the killers had taken the lives of her parents, two brothers, her uncles, grandparents, and other relatives, she kept true to her conversion. Even when she learned the rest of the world had unbelievably stood by and watched the bloodshed, she didn’t waver.

“Prayer changed everything,” she said. “I still have hope. There is so much to believe in.”

Ilibagiza offered parting advice to her rapt audience.

“Please love one another. Trust each other,” she said. “Peace starts with each one of us.”

The Mass ended with a congregational blessing led by Bishop Silva, hands extended, over the bowed heads of the civic leaders, and the singing of “America, the Beautiful.”