DAZEY, N.D. — It was one of the busiest and most celebrated weekends of the year for the devout members of St. Mary’s Catholic Church.

The parish east of Dazey in rural Barnes County has a tradition more than a century old of observing the Feast of Corpus Christi, which celebrates the Eucharist as being composed of the body and blood, soul and divinity of Jesus Christ.

German immigrant families brought the tradition of celebrating the feast with them when they started homesteading the land in the rolling hills rising from the Sheyenne River in the 1880s.

Many preparations go before the celebration, which includes an elaborate procession through the wooded churchyard. The priest, walking underneath a canopy held by altar servers, lifts up the monstrance, a vessel that holds the consecrat

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