Maryrose Oguezuonu of Middle River pressed forward as a procession bearing the Eucharist — the sacramental bread and wine that Catholics consider holy — passed by on the hot streets of downtown Indianapolis last weekend. She was among more than 50,000 other Catholics from across the United States in town for a nationwide revival, the 10th National Eucharistic Congress of the U.S.
Catholic Church. And as an attendant in the processional handed her a rose, she said she sensed a powerful spiritual presence. “I knew immediately that that was what Jesus had sent to me,” said Oguezuonu, a longtime parishioner at Our Lady Queen of Peace Catholic Church in her hometown.
“He told me, ‘This is the meaning of your name — Mary that is surrounded by roses.’ And roses are symbolic of the love of Jesus.” Oguezuonu was one of about 175 Catholics from greater Baltimore who made the trip to Indiana’s capital city for the five-day event, the first of its kind since 1941 and the culmination of a three-year campaign of renewal within the American church.
“It was a powerful moment in the history of the Catholic Church in the U.S.,” says Edward Herrera, the executive director of the Institute for Evangelization, an initiative of the Archdiocese of Baltimore, who also made the pilgrimage.
“There hasn’t been a Eucharistic Congress since the time of Fulton Sheen and Dorothy Day. Now we’ve enjoyed this beautiful event, an exciting moment for the people of Baltimore and for people around the country.” Eucharistic congresses — held sporadically and always considered significant — have been a Catholic tradition for more than 140 years.
They draw huge numbers of clergy members and lay Catholics from wide geographical areas to bear witness to what the faith sees as the literal presence of Jesus in the Eucharist, the sacramental bread and wine at the core of every Mass. The first such assembly, an international version, took place in Lille, France, in 1881, and more than 50 International Eucharistic Congresses have taken place since. They’ve been rarer in this country.
The first National Eucharistic Congress was held in Washington, D.C., in 1895.
The 83-year gap since the last one, held in St. Paul, Minnesota, was the longest in history. Herrera said the time was ripe.
Even a tradition that has long benefitted the faith — the way knowledge is passed along almost automatically from generation to generation — has helped contribute to what some sense is a loss of spiritual vitality, he says. And only about 31% of Catholics still believe in the Real Presence of Jesus Christ in the Eucharistic sacraments, according to a much-discussed 2019 survey by the Pew Research Center. Many believe that, in turn, has given rise to a flagging passion for evangelization — the practice of spreading the faith.
That’s why the U.S. Council of Catholic Bishops decided in 2022 to declare a National Eucharistic Revival, a movement designed to respond to “the divine invitation to be united once again around the source and summit of our faith in the celebration of the Eucharist.
” Last week’s convention, which ended Sunday, was the last of dozens of events held across the country as part of the movement. It included five days of open-air Masses, speaking engagements and live music in 70,000-seat Lucas Oil Stadium, faith-related breakout sessions and interactive activities in the Indiana Convention Center, and ongoing adoration of the Eucharist. About 100 people from central Maryland made the trip on a phalanx of buses provided by the Baltimore archdiocese, with the rest traveling on their own, Herrera said.
Many said they felt a form of rejuvenation that was especially welcome at a time when the church is still suffering fallout amid a sexual abuse scandal involving priests from around the world — and when the Baltimore archdiocese has had to realign its operations in the city due to huge maintenance costs and declining attendance. Carolyn Wilkinson, a Joppatowne artist, had concerns about making the trip. She suffers from a disability, generally avoids crowds and didn’t know if anyone else from her church, St.
Mark in Fallston, was going. But she said the other pilgrims she met on the bus kept such a careful eye out for her she could tell something profound was underway. Already awed by a sense of unity in the huge crowds, she was at the stadium Friday when Mother Olga of the Sacred Heart, the founder of a women’s apostolate in Boston that provides pastoral care in hospitals, hospices and prisons, told stories of what she called “Eucharistic miracles” of healing she has seen.
Since then, Wilkinson has felt an “amazing” sense of release from a near-addiction to cannabis-related painkillers she said she has battled for years. “I prayed for addiction healing, and since then I’ve felt no desire whatsoever to continue with the pain pills,” she said. “This feels different.
It feels like I’m on the road to healing.” Many experienced a powerful sense of spiritual unity on the first day of the assembly, Herrera said, when hundreds of pilgrims who had been traveling the country on foot in four separate geographical sectors came together in the stadium amid cheers and prayers. It happened again on Sunday as hundreds of priests, brothers and sisters strode chanting and praying through the streets behind the trailer that bore the Eucharist.
“These experiences of an outpouring of grace from the Lord can be a great source of encouragement, healing and hope, and they’re a great source of renewal for the church for sure,” Herrera said. Brian Rhude felt much the same way. “You could see by the look on people’s faces, or the tears rolling down their cheeks, or the look of elation they had when they saw someone they knew at Lucas Oil Stadium, that they were falling deeper in love with Jesus Christ,” said Rhude, who serves as the campus minister at the Newman Center at Towson University.
Most important, participants said, was their sense that many of the pilgrims intended to heed the call from the bishops and others onstage to go home and share the feeling of revival they’d experienced. Wilkinson said she attended a workshop last week in which a Catholic artist, having created woodblock carvings of the Eucharist, invited visitors to stamp out their own prayer cards. She has already spoken with her priest about offering a similar event at St.
Mark’s Octoberfest this year, and she hopes it will serve as a model for parishes to mobilize the talented painters, calligraphers and woodworkers in their pews. “I want to see an artistic revival at a grass-roots level in each parish, where individual parishioners create the art” to be used in activities. “I’d love to have them inspired to give their talents to the church.
” For his part, Rhude said the week has encouraged him to “be more devoted to the Blessed Sacrament every day,” to spend more time praying, and, as a minister, to overlook more easily the foibles of the college students he interacts with in favor of being “present” and encouraging them to “experience the Lord in a new and profound way.” Herrera said his evangelization institute will help to advance Walk With One, a churchwide initiative that aims to encourage Catholics to share their faith stories with others, and encourage and help equip parishes in the archdiocese to bring more Eucharistic processions to the streets. Oguezuonu, meanwhile, said discussions are underway to brainstorm how Our Lady Queen of Peace might incorporate what she learned into its activities moving forward.
That’s in keeping with a sermon she cited as a highlight of the week. During the final Mass Sunday, Cardinal Luis Antonio Tagle of the Philippines, an envoy of Pope Francis, urged the tens of thousands in the stadium to carry their message of renewal with them and share it with others as a first step toward revitalizing the faith across the nation. That, Oguezuonu said, was the whole point of a Congress that even organizers said would prove fruitless if attendees didn’t spread the word.
“We have been empowered by the Holy Spirit to spread the Gospel with boldness,” she said. “We don’t have to be afraid anymore to share our faith.”.
