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This is the first of a two-part series on how Catholics join together as a community of faith as expressed in the Church’s law on parishes (part one) and sacred places (part two).
Man is a religious being. Man is a social being. These two fundamental truths of human nature spring from our having been created with an immaterial soul capable of knowing and loving.
As such, we have an innate desire to use these faculties to be in communion with God and with those around us. This aspect of humanity is expressed beautifully in the account of creation in Genesis 2, in which Adam and Eve are established in a state of perfect harmony with God and with each other.
One result of mankind’s dual religious and social nature is the desire to come together in order to worship, a ritual expressed in every civilization in human history. We naturally join with those around us to pray and worship God, and what’s more, we often set aside some space dedicated to this purpose of communal prayer.
In this two-part article I will examine the way in which we, as Catholics, join together as a community of faith as expressed in the Church’s law on parishes (part one) and sacred places (part two).