The Altar of the World

For many years, I have had a wonderful friendship with the Pauline Fathers (the Order of St. Paul, the first Hermit). They established the National Shrine of Our Lady of Czestochowa in Doylestown, Pennsylvania in the 1960s, and have maintained a ministry to serve the spiritual needs of people ever since. They have inspired and formed many by their great love for Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament and our Blessed Mother, and their powerful pastoral outreach. The invited me to come to the Shrine on September 13 to celebrate Holy Mass, preach and preside over a Rosary procession. Why September 13? They have a wonderful custom (observed widely in Poland) to celebrate the 13th day of each month from May to October to commemorate those days in 1917 when Our Lady appeared in Fatima. They believe that it was through the intercession of Our Lady of Fatima that communism fell throughout Central and Eastern Europe. They likewise believe that today we need Our Lady’s intercession for peace, the healing of families and the renewal of a culture of life.
            
In May of 1967, Pope St. Paul VI made a pilgrimage to Fatima to commemorate the 50th anniversary of Our Lady’s apparitions there. On the occasion of his visit, the Holy Father called Fatima, “the altar of the world.” At first hearing, the reference may sound puzzling and require some reflection and prayer to understand its meaning. When we as Catholics hear the word “altar,” we immediately think of Mass. That is precisely the point.  Let’s think about it.
            
In Our Lady’s message to the three children, Lucia, Francisco and Jacinta, she asked for prayer (especially of the Rosary), penance for the salvation of souls, and acts reparation for the outrages, sacrileges, and indifference, which offend Jesus in the Holy Eucharist. In fact, the message of Fatima is a profoundly Eucharistic, because it encourages us to offer ourselves, our lives and our actions in union with the Sacrifice of Jesus offered on the altar at Mass. The Shrine at Fatima has, at the very heart of its life and mission, the offering of the Eucharistic Sacrifice of the Mass in the chapel at the very spot where Our Lady appeared, and in the beautiful basilica and other churches in the sanctuary. Another pivotal place at the shrine in Fatima is the Perpetual Adoration Chapel where Jesus is adored in the Blessed Sacrament each day throughout the year. 
            
Pope St. Paul VI was right in saying that Fatima is “the altar of the world.” People flock there from every nation to offer their prayers, their praise, their sufferings, their sorrows, and their acts of penance and reparation in union with the one, irreplaceable, life-giving Sacrifice of Jesus Christ made present at every Mass. People come in answer to Our Lady’s call to implore God’s help, strength, and grace for themselves, for those for whom they pray, and for the whole world.
           
We can say that this call is to the very bedrock of our Catholic Faith, the Holy Eucharist. This call comes to us comes to us through the Immaculate Heart of Mary. This should be no surprise as she desires to bring us to the very source of life and grace, the Eucharistic Heart of her Son as He offers Himself to the Father.
            
That is exactly what happened when I was at the National Shrine of Our Lady of Czestochowa last Friday. The hundreds of people who came to the Mass that evening  wholeheartedly united themselves with the Sacrifice of Jesus and received Him in Holy Communion. As they offered themselves at Mass in union with His Sacrifice, they prayed from their hearts for so many people, for so many intentions. How do I know this? Immediately after Mass, the people followed the statue of Our Lady of Fatima in a beautiful candlelight procession during which they prayed the Rosary and the Litany of Our Lady in different languages, concluding with the Act of Consecration to her Immaculate Heart. At the end, many people came to me and asked for my prayers for their intentions. Despite the many sorrows and burdens they carried in their hearts, they showed not a hint of desperation—only faith in the intercession of Our Blessed Mother and in the power of the Sacrifice of the Mass and Jesus’ Eucharistic Presence. If ever we are tempted to think we can do without the Eucharistic Sacrifice and the Real Presence of Jesus, we need only think of the people who come there in their great need and find hope and peace as well as the millions who come to Our Lady’s shrine in Fatima.  We see that it is all about sacrifice, is it not?  Our sacrifices, our sufferings, our sorrows, our lives only make sense when we offer them and ourselves in union with the Sacrifice of the Lord who offered Himself on the Cross because His unfailing love for us.
            
Pope St. John Paul II wrote in his encyclical letter on the Holy Eucharist, Ecclesia de Eucharistia about the beauty of coming to “the altar of the world”: “I have been able to celebrate Holy Mass in chapels built along mountain paths, on lakeshores and seacoasts; I have celebrated it on altars built in stadiums and in city squares. ...This varied scenario of celebrations of the Eucharist has given me a powerful experience of its universal and, so to speak, cosmic character. Yes, cos-mic! Because even when it is celebrated on the humble altar of a country church, the Eucharist is always in some way celebrated on the altar of the world. It unites heaven and earth. It embraces and permeates all creation (Ecclesia de Eucharistia, 8).”

St. John Paul reminded us that every time we come to the altar for Mass, we come to the “altar of the world”. Indeed, it is so in Fatima and in every place where Mass is offered. Come, then, my dear friends,and let us go to “the altar of the world” where heaven and earth are united, and where we offer ourselves, our prayers, and all we do for the healing and salvation of all!   We should settle for nothing less!
 
Most Reverend William J. Waltersheid
Auxiliary Bishop of Pittsburgh