<Begin Segment 11>

RP: Tell us about the activities that the church offered to, other than the mass, you know, masses, and what other activities and opportunities were offered through the Manzanar Catholic Church?

MI: Well, I think there was a lot of like helping one another, or helping visiting elderly people. You know, basically what you do today like volunteer work. And then they used to have Christmas plays. I had a picture, a book of Maryknoll, I wanted to show it to you and I can't remember where in the world I put it. But there's a picture of the nativity and that was taken in camp. I didn't take that picture so I don't have it. But yeah, we did used to put on these little programs.

RP: What was Christmas like in camp for you?

MI: Oh, I'll never forget, I guess probably one of the most memorable Christmas ever is etched in my mind and it's at Manzanar. We went to midnight mass and the usual, going to the mass and greeting everybody, saying "Merry Christmas." We were walking home, home meaning the barrack, and I looked up at the sky and it was absolutely still. There was no breeze, no wind, or nothing. It was just dark and then you could see all the stars. And it was almost like you felt the presence. It was like... it really touched me. I don't know what it was but it really... the stars, you know, it was just seemed almost like you're thinking about Bethlehem. And I'll never forget that, walking from the church and we have to go uphill, you know, to go to what, Block 25, then there's a fire break and then Block 32. You're going uphill and then you're going towards the mountain. And the mountains at night looked blue for some reason, don't they, iridescent. Then you look up at the sky and says, "God, look at the sky. Look at the stars." It was, it was... this is a holy night. That was all we could think of. I never forgot that. To this day I keep thinking about it. And then we had Men's Society, and then we had Cause Fidelity, which was the girls. And as, those were basically either prayers or helping one another, helping people in need. We had two nuns there, too.

RP: That was...

MI: Sister Susanna and Sister Bernadette.

RP: What do you remember about them in camp and what they did?

MI: Well, I used to think, you know, what a hard life for them. A nun? What kind of a threat are they? They had to endure the same hardship and inconvenience like the rest of us. Even the shower was wide open. And somewhere along the line they put a little shelter for the nuns, which I was glad.

RP: In the shower?

MI: Yeah. And then they wore these heavy, you know, the... what do they call it? Nuns' outfit, you know. Oh gosh and that temperature and all? How in the world do they stand that? Either they get used to it or what, but God, that is so confining. And I used to always think about that. How did they do that? Did they offer it up as a sacrifice to God? Yeah, it was a total dedication to good work. And anybody, anybody could come to the church if they were in trouble. They didn't have to be Catholics, tt could be anybody. And a lot of people did. In fact, there's one story where Father Lavery was too ill to come and say the mass. And we were all in the chapel and... I can't remember where I heard this story, but, and I can't even remember if I'd remembered that incident. But, however, so we were all in the church and this non-Catholic gentleman heard about it. And he was a collector of Gregorian music. So during mass, supposedly mass period, we sat and we listened to the Gregorian music, the Gregorian mass. So when they say God works in strange ways, I go, yeah, you're right. But I was, you know, I thought that was very inspiring.

RP: Were you involved personally in Sunday school or helping out kids in the church there?

MI: Yeah. Here and there, yeah. Can't remember now most of the things but, oh, you know. There was a bunch of us. We were just a bunch of organizers. We'd get in there and says, okay, come on. Let's, let's do this or we'll do that or whatever. I feel as if it's a natural thing to do.

RP: Camp it was a difficult situation which probably tested some people's faiths. How, what were the sermons like that, you know, Father Lavery, Father Steinbach delivered? What was the essence of their message to the situation you were involved in?

MI: You know, I can't remember any of the sermons, which is kind of sad. But I would assume that it was uplifting because they were both very uplifting. Father Lavery never dwelled on the negative, and neither did Father Steinbach. What was his... there was another priest. Well, he was a character. He was fun. He was the one that had two dogs, I remember.

RP: In camp?

MI: No, he would bring 'em. That was his own dogs. You know, priests didn't stay in the camp. They came, said mass, and then they stayed either in Lone Pine or they went back to L.A.

RP: Was that pretty frequent that you'd have traveling priests?

MI: Every weekend.

RP: Every weekend somebody would come out?

MI: That, when you think about that, there's only so many priests and they went to the ten camps? That's amazing dedication. And then there were people who were non-Catholic who had a request to make and wouldn't trust anybody else and they would ask fathers to do it. So that was, that was interesting because at least they had the mobility to come down to L.A. and get things that anybody else could not.

<End Segment 11> - Copyright © 2008 Manzanar National Historic Site and Densho. All Rights Reserved.