by Marc and Julie Anderson
mjanderson@theleaven.org
INDIANAPOLIS — “Go. Don’t stay. Go. Go and tell others about the gift you have received.”
That’s what Bishop Andrew Cozzens of the Diocese of Crookston, Minnesota, told more than 50,000 pilgrims gathered from across the country for the closing session of the 10th National Eucharistic Congress held July 17-21 at Lucas Oil Stadium in Indianapolis.
Sparked by a study conducted in 2019 indicating only 31% of Catholics believed the Eucharist is the true body, blood, soul and divinity of Jesus Christ, the National Eucharistic Congress was the first one since 1941. It’s just one part of the Eucharistic Revival campaign undertaken by the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops in 2022 and continuing through Pentecost 2025, a campaign that Bishop Cozzens is leading.
At times becoming emotional, Bishop Cozzens instructed the pilgrims to leave as eucharistic missionaries.
“As Cardinal Tagle said so beautifully in his homily, ‘What you have received as a gift, you must give as a gift. . . . 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 to befriend them and then to invite them to take one step closer to Jesus and his church?
“What would happen if 70 million Catholics did that? . . . Commit yourself to becoming a eucharistic missionary, someone who lives deeply a eucharistic life and — having received that gift — allows themselves to be given as a gift.”
Pilgrim’s progress
Among those eucharistic missionaries were nearly 250 pilgrims from the archdiocese, including Rob Peschel from St. Gregory the Great Parish in Marysville and Deacon Michael Uhlmansiek from Church of the Ascension in Overland Park.
“It seemed to me one of the common [takeaways] from the conference was the challenge for each of us there to not be afraid to come back home and ‘plant those seeds’ at our parishes,” said Peschel. “Allow the Holy Spirit to give you the courage to have the small conversations with others.
“I think Chris Stefanick said it best: ‘When the Holy Spirit opens the door for you, you need to open your mouth and say something.’ I think sometimes we paralyze ourselves because we feel our conversations need to be some kind of earth-shattering evangelization event.”
Deacon Uhlmansiek agreed.
“I liked the call to ‘go, go, go.’ It is easy to be energized at these types of gatherings,” he said. “After all, we spent the last four days adoring and praising Jesus in the company of 50,000 joyous Catholics, and we are grateful for the experience!”
“As a deacon,” he continued, “my job is to help spread this eucharistic experience to my family, parish and community.”
He and his wife Jeri arrived at the event in time to see the Eucharist being processed into the stadium by Bishop Cozzens as he officially opened the congress with eucharistic adoration.
Eucharist arrives
Prior to eucharistic adoration though, the perpetual pilgrims of the four pilgrimage routes who had traveled with Jesus for 60 days from four sections of the country processed into the stadium to resounding cheers.
Trudy Boynton, who belongs to Holy Trinity Parish in Lenexa, said that was one of her favorite moments.
“That was magnificent, really and truly, to see them coming in as teams with the picture of their patron for the pilgrimage route,” said Boynton. “It was very moving, really and truly. It brought tears to my tears.”
After eucharistic adoration, the evening moved into a general session for all attendees, a pattern repeated every night. Dubbed a revival session, each featured some of the most well-known speakers, apologists, music ministers and priests found within the Catholic Church today. Among their number were: Father Mike Schmitz, known for his podcasts (“The Bible in a Year with Father Mike Schmitz” and “The Catechism in a Year with Father Mike Schmitz”); Mother Olga, the foundress and servant daughter of the Daughters of Mary of Nazareth in the Archdiocese of Boston; Catholic recording artist Matt Maher and Jonathan Roumie, best known for portraying Jesus in “The Chosen.”
Daily rosaries and liturgies, opportunities for confession, the veneration of relics and a eucharistic procession of thousands who proudly walked behind Jesus along a milelong route, also provided pilgrims a myriad of ways to grow in their eucharistic love.
Messages of hope
For Jeri Uhlmansiek, the speakers moved her deeply.
“There’s so many people on stage just giving their testimony to how the Eucharist has touched their life or somebody else’s life and making it really tangible for people instead of just receiving the Eucharist,” she said.
One talk resonated deeply with participant John Gilchrist, a member of Holy Spirit Parish in Overland Park. During the first revival session, Mother Olga shared four stories of people whose lives had been profoundly changed when she brought the eucharistic Lord to them.
“Her message was real and from one that is living Christ’s mission on earth,” Gilchrist said. “She evoked images and memories of St. Mother Teresa. Mother Olga’s mission is among the disenfranchised, the sick and the suffering. She’s looking for and finding Christ in all she encounters. She said, ‘We have him, and no one can take him away.’ She said, ‘This is the same Christ in every parish, every church, every diocese. This is the same Jesus in the hospitals, NICUs and in nursing homes. He is the Jesus of yesterday, today and forever.’
“Mother Olga credibly conveyed the power of Christ in the Eucharist and the constant miracles through the Eucharist.”
Joan Henry, a parishioner of Sts. Peter and Paul in Seneca, said perhaps one of the most moving testimonies for her was that of Msgr. James Shea, president of the University of Mary in Bismarck, North Dakota. His talk focused on satisfying spiritual hunger through the Eucharist.
“The body and blood of the Lord is the source of our life, our energy and our joy,” concluded Msgr. Shea on a rising powerful note. “So, let’s eat and drink here and every day to our heart’s content and then let’s rush out into a starving world and tell everybody we meet, ‘Starving people: Listen! We found where the food is! We found where the food is!’”
Henry said Msgr. Shea’s words definitely fired her up as she reflected on “the importance of spending time with God yourself and that’s what feeds you to feed others.” She said she plans to try and do a better job of feeding others around her.
Feeding others, Larissa Smith, director of parish life and evangelization at Prince of Peace Parish in Olathe, was brought home to her through Damon Owens, founder of joytob, a ministry “dedicated to proclaiming the joy of being made in the image and likeness of God, male and female.”
“He talked about the inhale and exhale [movements] and how everybody needs to breathe,” Smith said, adding, “He said that we want to inhale Jesus and exhale Jesus, and when you inhale Jesus, that’s you going into [eucharistic] adoration, attending Mass and daily Mass, going to confession and those things for yourselves.”
“But when you exhale Jesus,” Smith continued, “you’re exhaling Jesus out to the people, whether that’s serving the poor or being with the dying or the sick or anybody like that.”
“Too many people think, ‘I’m just going to inhale,’” Smith added. “No, that’s when you die. You have to inhale and exhale.”
Smith said she wants to return home with that momentum of “just putting people on mission and being unapologetic about it, walking in and saying, ‘You know what? Jesus loves you. He wants you to be with him, but he also wants you to share it with other people. And you are someone who can share it with other people. You don’t have to be a theologian. You don’t have to know all the facts, but just sharing Jesus’ love for you with somebody else can put somebody else’s heart on fire and help them learn and know Jesus.”
Time with Jesus
While Dorothy Boyle, a member of St. Michael the Archangel Parish in Leawood, said she enjoyed the various speakers, the many opportunities for eucharistic adoration and Mass also inspired her.
“The music has been absolutely a big contribution to every one of the liturgies and [eucharistic] adoration,” she said. “It’s just beautiful, and the setting with the lighting, and to see all of the priests and the bishops and deacons and then you come out of there and you see all of the religious women and the different habits, especially to see how young they are and how joyful they are.”
Juan Vasquez, a seminarian from Christ the King Church in Kansas City, Kansas, said he witnessed the love people have for clergy and religious firsthand, particularly during the much-anticipated eucharistic procession.
“As the seminarians were processing by, people were just shouting, ‘Thank you! Thank you! We need you guys.’ You can really tell there’s this hunger for the Eucharist, and so, I think that’s what it’s been for me, just a renewal in my heart of what the Eucharist is and has been for me and my life.”
But perhaps it was Nikki Frerker from Curé of Ars in Leawood who best summarized the Congress.
Sharing thoughts about the closing Mass celebrated by Cardinal Luis Antonio Tagle, the pope’s envoy for the Congress, she said, “As I watched all the people weaving through the aisles to receive the Eucharist at the final Mass, it looked from high up in section 418 like the blood of life running beautifully through the mystical body of Christ . . . the people of God, the church. It’s like we all came to Indy to enter into the heart of Christ and his wounds, and in that sacred space, we received new life in him, to take forth and share with the world.”
Father Anthony Chendumalli, pastor of Annunciation Parish in Frankfort, St. Monica/St. Elizabeth in Blue Rapids, and St. Columbkille in Blaine, agreed.
“I loved the cardinal’s homily of how we have received the gift and now we take that gift to others in our parishes. Everyone, as disciples of Christ, can go out and bring [it to] one person who turned away from the faith. Every Catholic must do it. That’s what the real Eucharist means for us today. Let’s pray for God’s grace so that all of us can work for it and bring change in the world.”
To experience more of the National Eucharistic Congress itself and to stay up-to-date on plans for the 11th National Eucharistic Congress currently planned for the year 2033 and/or to learn more about the Eucharistic Revival campaign, go online to: www.eucharisticcongress.org or www.eucharisticrevival.org.
Outstanding article!