By Sister Maria Elena Mendez. MGSPS
CARTHAGE – The St. Anne Parish community celebrated their patroness on Sunday, July. 29. The women of the parish led a procession with the statue of St. Anne around the Church’s property followed by a bilingual Mass at 10:30. Father Odel Medina, ST, was the celebrant. After the Mass everyone was invited to a celebratory meal. Representatives from many cultures were on hand to celebrate their “grandmother,” as they call St. Anne since she was Mary’s mother.
Her actual feast day is July 26. Legend holds that Anne and her husband Joachim thought they were barren so Anne prayed for a child. When she found out she was pregnant with Mary, she promised to concecrate the child to God and took Mary to the temple at the age of three to fulfill that promise. The parishioners in Carthage have celebrated this feast with a procession for several years.
St. Anne is the patron of women in labor and miners.

(Sister Maria Elena Mendez is a coordinator for Hispanic Ministry for the Diocese of Jackson.)