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Nice to see my brothers in the KofC out in front!
Undoubtedly due to the relentless attacks on Catholics and other Christians by the evil ones on the ravening left.
Leni
bump
We're having one of these in Philly in October. I expect 10's, possibly 100's of thousands. Our parish and all the neighboring parishes are offering free busses downtown.
The article has the day wrong--it was on Friday, August 5, not on Sunday, August 7. The Knights of Columbus had a convention the preceding several days and the procession was intended to cap it off.
I was there. It was probably a little less than 10,000 people, maybe 9 or 8. We got there about about 1:30 in the afternoon, in front of the Petrillo Bandshell in Grant Park. For those of you unfamiliar with downtown Chicago, Grant Park is right on Lake Michigan, between Lake Shore Drive and the skyscrapers of downtown Chicago.
At first, there didn't seem to be that many people there, but then we looked to the south, and we saw thousands of people arriving in a procession leading all the way back to Buckingham Fountain. There were Knights of Columbus, in full regala, followed by thousands of people. The banners mentioned in the article were made to represent individual parishes throughout the city. People generally marched behind the banner of their individual parish. Some of the banners were pretty elaborate, especially from some of the Polish parishes in the city. There were also banners from Catholic hospitals.
At the end of the procession was a canopy, under which the Blessed Sacrament was displayed. Cardinal George carried the Blessed Sacrament at the end of the procession. The procession concluded at an altar on a makeshift stage built in front of the Petrillo Bandshell (I'll explain more about that later) Then Cardinal George led everybody in a benediction.
Among the thousands of people there at the benediction were a lot of young families, as well as teenagers and college-age kids. My wife and I were there with our five year old son and 22-month old daughter. We saw a few friends here and there, but ended up attending the benediction with these friends of ours and their seven young kids. It was the type of crowd where your 22-month old could walk around a little and you knew she wasn't going to bother anyone. It was also pretty cool to be singing the Pange Lingua among thousands of people in the middle of downtown Chicago on a Friday afternoon. The Cardinal gave an inspiring homily about personal conversion.
After it was over. I was talking to a priest I knew there that explained to me that the Chicago Park District wouldn't allow the Archdiocese to use the Petrillo Bandshell itself for the benediction because they didn't want city property to be used for religious purposes. (Rock groups and jazz bands-yes, benedictions-no) So the Archdiocese simply built their own stage.
Oh boy.