The Archdiocese of Chicago is expected to restrict the exposition of the Eucharist during a national Eucharistic pilgrimage that will traverse the Chicago region next year, ahead of the Eucharistic Congress scheduled for next July.
The anticipated restriction comes amid differences of emphasis and approach among U.S. bishops over the Church’s Eucharistic revival process, now underway, and the $14 million Eucharistic Congress planned for 2024 — especially over the revival’s emphasis on adoration of the Eucharist.
While Cardinal Blase Cupich has argued that an emphasis on adoration could distract from catechesis about the importance of the Mass, Bishop Andrew Cozzens has stressed a unified vision between Eucharistic adoration and the worship of God in the Mass.
According to three senior Church officials close to the Eucharistic pilgrimage, the Chicago archdiocese has told organizers of the Eucharistic pilgrimage that, while pilgrims may travel through the archdiocese during their processional walk to Indianapolis, they are expected to reserve the Eucharist in a ciborium, rather than process with the Eucharist exposed in a monstrance, as the pilgrimage will do in other areas of the country.
A source with knowledge of the pilgrimage planning said that when pilgrims traverse through Chicago in the summer of 2024, the archdiocese will conduct a Mass at Holy Name Cathedral, followed by a Eucharistic procession led by Cardinal Cupich — but that the Eucharist will otherwise be expected to be reserved as pilgrims travel.
“He told them they could go through Chicago, but they couldn’t expose the Blessed Sacrament while they were walking. That seemed to be the compromise that they got about coming at all,” according to one senior Church official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak on the record.
Other officials close to the Eucharistic pilgrimage confirmed that account.
The 2024 national Eucharistic Congress is sanctioned by the U.S. bishops’ conference, but organized by an independent nonprofit formed for just that purpose, whose board of directors is chaired by Bishop Andrew Cozzens. Five other bishops sit on the nonprofit's board, along with four laypeople.
While the Congress is expected to draw pilgrims from across the U.S., it will be preceded officially by four walking pilgrimages, organized by the Eucharistic Congress staff and by Modern Catholic Pilgrim, a San Diego based nonprofit with expertise in planning pilgrimages.
The four walking pilgrimages will begin in May 2024, commencing in San Francisco; at the tomb of Blessed Michael McGivney in New Haven, Connecticut; at the U.S.-Mexico border near Brownsville, Texas; and at the headwaters of the Mississippi River, in northwestern Minnesota.
They will conclude shortly before the Congress begins in Indianapolis next July.
Cozzens told The Pillar last year that the pilgrimages aim “to invite everyone; young people and whoever wants to pilgrimage with Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament across the country from four sides of the country, praying and seeking their own deeper walk with Jesus, as we process the Blessed Sacrament towards Indianapolis.”
Each pilgrimage will be anchored by a team of young adults committed to walking most of the pilgrimage route to Indianapolis, while sleeping at churches along the way, and traveling with a support van for logistics. Catholics will be invited to accompany the pilgrimage teams as they make their way by foot to Indianapolis.
Each team is expected to be accompanied by priests, many of them members of the Franciscan Friars of the Renewal.
Cozzens explained that the teams will partner with local dioceses to undertake major processions — “with the canopy and cross and servers and people singing hymns and praying and things like that” as they pass through cities along their routes.
But for the “miles on miles” outside of such cities, the teams will normally undertake either “a simple walking procession — a priest or a deacon carrying the Blessed Sacrament and a simple monstrance, but without a canopy and people walking prayerfully,” or they will process using a specially designed electric vehicle meant for publicly viewable exposition and adoration of the Eucharist, with pilgrims walking behind and alongside the vehicle.
Cozzens explained that in “places where there’s hundreds of miles with no people — when we’re going across the desert of Nevada, for example … we might repose the Blessed Sacrament or at least prayerfully carry it in a van while we're going across the larger miles.”
But sources close to the pilgrimage told The Pillar that planners now expect they will also repose the Blessed Sacrament while walking through the Archdiocese of Chicago — after a decision on the matter from officials in the archdiocese.
Congress organizers declined to clarify directly their plans for the pilgrimage in the Archdiocese of Chicago, saying that the planning process is still underway.
In response to questions, Congress executive director Tim Glemkowski told The Pillar that: “The National Eucharistic Pilgrimage is working in close collaboration with staff in each of the 64 dioceses the pilgrimage route will pass [through].”
“Every segment of the pilgrimage will be a distinct experience of each local diocese that will highlight the holy sites, cultural experiences, and Eucharistic life of that local church. Each diocese is creatively engaged in the planning process to allow a unique experience of the pilgrimage throughout all four pilgrim routes,” Glemkowski added.
“The pilgrimage will be a powerful, once-in-a-lifetime witness of how Jesus Christ comes close to us and invites all to encounter him in the Eucharist. We could not be more excited to be moving forward with each of our diocesan partners in the planning and execution of this incredible opportunity for our Church in the U.S,“ he said