By S.L. Hansen
for the Register
At the closing Mass of the National Eucharistic Congress in Indianapolis last month, Cardinal Luis Antonio Tagle of the Philippines, commissioned as Pope Francis’ envoy, and chairman of the National Eucharistic Congress board Bishop Andrew Cozzens (Crookston, Minn.) ushered in the third phase of the Eucharistic Revival: sharing with others.
In his homily, Cardinal Tagle, pro-prefect of the Vatican Dicastery for Evangelization, delivered the Holy Father’s message that he wanted the Congress to lead to more people experiencing a “conversion to the Eucharist.”
“The Presence of Jesus in the Eucharist is a gift and the fulfillment of His mission,” said the cardinal. “Let us go to proclaim Jesus zealously and joyfully for the life of the world.” Bishop Cozzens said the United States Council of Catholic Bishops was actively discerning another National Eucharistic Congress, hopefully scheduled in 2033, and another national Eucharistic Pilgrimage for 2025. However, there is no need to wait.
“We’ve invited you to walk with one person,” he said to the estimated 55,000 in attendance. “What would happen if each of you thought of one person you know who’s currently away from the faith; and you decided to pray for them, and befriend them, and then invite them to take one step closer to Jesus and his Church?”
“This, the third year, is the year of mission,” Bishop James Conley explained. “This is really the ‘sending out.’”
Priests, religious, seminarians and laypeople of the Diocese of Lincoln who went to the Congress have been pondering how to fulfill this exhortation.
“I’m still processing” was a common final thought from so many pilgrims as they returned home to their families, parishes and communities. Before he journeyed home to the Diocese of Fargo after the Congress, Bishop John Folda – originally a priest of the Diocese of Lincoln – said a quiet, inner renewal for Congress attendees would be an appropriate beginning.
“If nothing else, there is a renewal of prayer that has happened at this event,” he reflected. “Praying in the presence of our Eucharistic Lord has its own grace, and that’s, by nature, a very quiet and personal experience. But from that quiet, we go out.”
“One point that really stuck out to me; this is only the beginning,” said Derrek Sumner, who is in the College 4 year at Saint Gregory the Great Seminary in Seward. “I want to be fed in that and not stop the growth. I don’t want to think that now we’re back in Nebraska, the congress is done.”
Father Mark Seiker, pastor of St. Mary Parish in Aurora and St. Joseph Parish in Giltner, was struck by how close attendees, including himself, felt to Jesus during the Congress.
“We need more of that in our parishes,” he said.
Thinking of how saints like Maximillian Kolbe, Thérèse of Lisieux, and Pope John Paul II drew people to Christ by their own inner love for Him, Father Seiker said, “We can do that. We can say yes to Jesus and have an effect on other people… That’s how change happens.”
Two days into the Congress, Laura Becarra of Lincoln’s Cristo Rey Parish had already been inspired to re-start a program at Cristo Rey called Niñas y Niños de la Eucaristía (Girls and Boys of the Eucharist).
As an artist and poet, Mary Dixon of St. Michael Parish in Hastings was contemplating how she could share what she brought home from the Congress.
“I deal in beauty and helping people to see the beauty in the world,” she said as she considered new ways to serve her parish with her God-given skills.
Mother Margaret Mary, C.K., said the School Sisters of Christ the King would be taking the zeal of Eucharistic love into each of the schools they serve this fall.
“Sharing this experience with our students will be an opportunity to foster in them a greater love for Jesus in the Eucharist, a greater sense of the universal Church, a greater awe and reverence for the mystery of the priesthood,” she said.
Bishop Conley noted that having more Eucharistic processions and Eucharistic adoration hours in schools and parishes would be two helpful strategies to increase devotion to the Lord.
“I would like to expand the hours of Eucharistic adoration in our parishes as much as possible for two reasons: to give honor and glory to God and to adore Him, but also to create spaces of silence in a very noisy world,” he said. “When you go into adoration chapel and turn your phone off, you can be reasonably sure that you’re not going to be distracted… We need that silence.”
He said he hopes that every parish that has enough members to cover the 168 hours available each week will begin to offer perpetual Eucharistic adoration. Smaller parishes can find ways to offer adoration for more hours weekly, giving parishioners – and newcomers to the Catholic faith – more opportunities to dwell in what Pope Saint John Paul II called “the Eucharist amazement.”
“We should be constantly amazed with the Eucharist,” Bishop Conley enjoined. “Not only did Jesus Christ suffer, die and rise from the dead to save us from our sins, it wasn’t a one-and-done thing. He chose to remain with us in the Eucharist. He didn’t leave us as orphans. The way He stays with us is through the Eucharist.”
