Report for the International Commission for

Eucharistic Congresses.
Rome: November 2018

Earlier this year, history was made in the Church in England and Wales. From
7th-9th September there was a Eucharistic Congress in Liverpool, in the north
of England, which remains the most Catholic area of the country. It was the first
Eucharistic Congress to be held in England since 1908 and in those days the
attitude to Catholics was more hostile than it is today, so much so, that the
British Government with the support of King George V forbade the Blessed
Sacrament to be carried in the street for fear of civil unrest. We live in a more
ecumenical age now. This time the Anglican bishop of Liverpool and the
Methodist Chairman worked with Archbishop Malcolm McMahon OP in the
street of Liverpool in the Blessed Sacrament procession on the final day of the
Congress.
Over the course of three days, the Congress was attended by over 10,000
people. There was also a parallel youth event which was organised by the
Archdiocese of Liverpool which was attended by 1,000 young people. The main
event was representative of a cross section of Catholicism in our countries with
many lay faithful of different ages and backgrounds, clergy both secular and
regular, male and female religious and most the seminarians of our six
seminaries. The majority of the serving bishops of England and Wales were
present and also representatives of the Scottish and Irish Episcopal Conferences.
We were also honoured by the presence of Archbishop Piero Marini and Fr
Vittore Boccardi of the International Commission for Eucharistic Congresses in
Rome.

In common with similar Congresses throughout the world, the weekend was
one of joy and celebration. People of all ages were visibly happy to share and
celebrate their love of the Blessed Sacrament which has always been a feature
of Catholicism in our countries. During the plenary session His Excellency
Archbishop Edward Adams, Nuncio of His Holiness to Her Majesty’s
Government read a letter from the Holy Father to all the participants which
acknowledged this fact. In it Pope Francis called to mind the great devotion the
English and Welsh have shown to the Mass especially in penal times when a

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priest would be executed for celebrating the Eucharist and the laity faced huge
fines and imprisonment and sometimes death. Pope Francis said:

Remaining faithful to that spiritual legacy requires more than an act of

remembrance, we must continue to bear witness to the same Lord and the same
precious gift of the Eucharist today for past glories are always a beginning and
not an end. “The Lord is calling you still to go out and bear witness,” the Holy
Father said. “I pray that through a greater participation in the sacrificial gift of
Jesus in the form of bread and wine you may all be sustained in faith and
renewed in joyful missionary discipleship. Such witness, he said, would manifest
itself particularly in practical concern for the most vulnerable in society.”

On the first day of the Congress there was a study day of theological talks and
reflections on the Eucharist in scripture, in ecclesiology and in education. These
were followed by workshops which dealt with more practical topics such as
teaching children to pray, guidelines for extraordinary ministers of the
Eucharist, liturgical praxis, ecumenism and catechetics.

On the second day, about seven thousand people were present. On this day there
were talks, testimonies and dramas and a period of Eucharistic adoration led by
Cardinal Vincent Nichols, Archbishop of Westminster. Bishop Robert Barron of
Los Angeles gave two keynote addresses which were extremely popular. After
both talks he was given a standing ovation. Bishop Barron said

“It means a lot, I think, for the Church which, as you know, is going through a
painful time and during these periods I think it is so important that we return to
the fundamentals. That means, above all, Christ in the Eucharist, It is so
wonderful that we are going to celebrate, to speak about and understand more
deeply the Eucharist.”

During his first speech, Bishop Barron reminded delegates of their duty to
evangelise. “We don’t have to fly over oceans to go to mission territory today,”
he said. “You walk outside the door of any church in the Western world and you
are in mission country.” He said the “rising tide of secularism” was driving
increasing numbers of people away from religion.

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“I see it every day, especially among the young,” said Bishop Barron. “People are
losing the sense of God, the sense of the transcendent. They need us. Everybody –
they need us. We who have been Christified at the Mass are now sent to
Christify the world. That is Vatican II in a nutshell,” he added. “The idea of
Vatican II wasn’t to turn the Church into the world, it was to turn the world into
Christ.”

These talks are available on YouTube for anyone to see.

The Liverpool Archdiocese generously organised a parallel programme of
various activities in and around the city. These ranged from an experience of
Lectio Divina to concerts of sacred music and a session of ‘Nightfever’ in the
city’s Blessed Sacrament Shrine. There were also organised Walking Tours of
Liverpool and an opportunity to engage with CAFOD - the national Caritas
organisation. There was an opportunity to “Meet a Missionary” and to visit and
pray with the Carmelite community of nuns in the city and many other fringe
events.
The theme of Eucharistic adoration was one chosen by the bishops to encourage
what is once again becoming a normal part of devotional life in our parishes.
The worship of the Eucharist outside of Mass is a means by which we affirm
and strengthen our Eucharistic faith so that our participation in the Mass
becomes more profound. The closeness to the Lord which we experience
through the Eucharist is a starting point for the New Evangelisation. Pope
Francis is constantly reminding us to be “missionary disciples” and to go to the
margins to bring others to Christ. Adoremus was an opportunity for us to do
this. We cannot be missionary disciples until we have a personal relationship
with Jesus Christ. It is above all in the Eucharist, the “source and summit” of
our life with Christ and the Church that we gain strength and courage to go to
the margins of our society. To be a missionary disciple comes from a profound
knowledge that we are loved by God and the Eucharist is the place that we
encounter that love sacramentally. Consequently this leads us to become
missionary disciples with a practical concern for the material and spiritual needs
of our brothers and sisters.

In his homily during the period of Adoration Cardinal Nichols said:

“In this Eucharist, this thanksgiving, lies the source of our mission. From this
Adoration we run forth, wanting, longing to share with others this great secret

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outpouring of life and goodness which has been disclosed to us. There is no true
mission in the Church that does not start here, in prayer, before the Lord.”

He went on to say that the Congress also had a penitential character in the light
of the clerical sexual abuse scandals which have shocked and hurt so many
people in Britain and elsewhere. The Cardinal asked us to pray especially for
the victims of abuse.
In the United Kingdom and elsewhere these sickening crimes against children
and the vulnerable have weakened the mission of the Church and turned many
away from the practise of the faith. The desire for penance and reparation were
in the minds and hearts of many pilgrims. So we came to Liverpool partly in a
spirit of penitence for our lack of faith and love and as pilgrims we turned to the
Lord in reparation for the sins of the clergy and all those responsible for the
terrible crimes of abuse.
The final Mass in the Metropolitan Cathedral of Christ the King was a joyful
occasion and together with the Eucharistic procession that followed; it was a
profound demonstration of our Eucharistic faith. Despite the heavy rain during
the procession, the many thousands that attended were deeply encouraged and
strengthened by the public witness of their faith. On seeing the Eucharistic
procession an atheist passer-by tweeted that, “a peace came over Liverpool
which I have never known before.”
The Congress has had a profound effect on those who took part in it and many
returned home determined to share their experiences in their parishes and local
communities. It is probably too early to quantify the effects of Adoremus or to
assess its results. Many dioceses are having follow up events in the weeks ahead
and there are a number of parishes, movements and other communities who are
meeting to reflect on the outcome of the Congress.
There are already reports of increased periods of adoration in churches and
schools especially in response to the appeal of Aid to the Church in Need
(ACN) to attend Mass and Adoration for those Christians who are unable to do
so. Within the week after the Congress 150 churches and schools had made
enquiries to ACN. Some parishes in Birmingham are having a yearlong
catechesis on the Eucharist starting in Advent and there appears to be a renewed
interest and desire to organise local Eucharistic processions at the time of the
Solemnity of Corpus Christi.
England and Wales is an increasingly secularised society in common with much
of Western Europe and North America. Adoremus was an opportunity for the

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Catholic Church to show its inner life and strength. The weeks and months
ahead will demonstrate the dynamism of this national pastoral initiative.