1947, Marian Congress - Pope Delivers Message of hope

POPE RADIOS MESSAGE OF HOPE TO MARIAN MEET

The Catholic Northwest Progress

Seattle Washington

Friday June, 27, 1947

200,000 Pilgrims throng Congress in Canada Capital Holy Father says Consecration of Canada to Mary Was Crowning Event of Great International Meeting.

By J. Frank Williams

(Canadian Correspondent, N.C.W.C News Service)

Ottawa, June 22 - Canada’s Capital became a City of 400,000 twice its normal size, as a tremendous throng of Catholics, led by members of the Hierarchy from five continents, assisted in the consecration of the Dominion to Mary the Mother of God at the five-day Marian Congress here.

The highlight of the ceremonies was a direct broadcast to the Congress by His Holiness Pope Pius XII speaking from Vatican City. The Pope’s message was carried across all the major radio networks across Canada.

The Pontiff, in extending his greetings to the Ottawa Catholics on the success of the Congress and on the 100 th Anniversary of the erection of their diocese, said that the meeting was a memorable event in the proud annals of Canada “and described the consecration of the country to Mary as its crowning act.

(This act of consecration was recited before a great crowd at the 155-foot- high Landsdowne Park outdoor altar during Sunday’s closing Pontifical mass. Louis St. Laurent, Canadian Secretary of State for External Affairs read the Act in French and Dr. J.J. McCann, Dominion Minister of National Revenue, read it in English.

In his closing remarks the Pontiff said. “Take courage and know that the Immaculate Mother of God had appealed to her Divine Son so that the repentance of the world will bring redemption Holy Father recalled that Canada had been the home of intrepid missionaries since the days of Jacques Cartier and he called on the people of Canada to continue their traditional work of charity to other countries and to maintain their traditions of faith against all who would seek to undermine these traditions.

This Congress was not the first time that Canada’s skies had been rent by paeans of praise to the Blessed Mother, he noted. From the earliest beginnings of Canada’s History, this country had given Mary’s sweet name to a river, a lake, and a mountain and had a chapel dedicated to the Immaculate Conception of the Virgin Mary. The Blessed Mother, he said was “creation’s incomparable glory.”

No path of circumstances is hidden from her anxious care. Go forward, then with determination, o dear young men and young women, vindicate the glory of your Immaculate Mothe. In the face of a vicious world prove that young hearts can still be chaste. And oh, how much depends on the genuine active Catholicity of the home!”

AS the direct representative of Pope Pius XII, his Eminence, James Cardinal McGuigan, Archbishop of Ottawa, was accorded every civil honor befitting his office as Papal Legate. Prime Minister MacKenzie King welcomed him on behalf of the Government of Canada and Stanley Lewis, Mayor of Ottawa, extended the welcome on behalf of the city.

The Message of the Marian Congress: Intercession with the Mother of God to obtain from her Divine Son, lasting world peace was the keynote of all the addresses delivered by world-known prelates during the Congress

“The story of Catholics’ faith in the intercession of the Blessed Virgin was told visually in colorful floats, and fireworks, pageants, as well as in the various religious ceremonies.

A statue of our Lady from Cap-de-la-Madeleine, Que. was installed in the Peace Chapel at Landsdowne Park and a series of masses – day and night – without interruption began. There were 48 masses each 24 hours, one every half hour.

There were 250 different priests who said the masses, most of the priests being members of the Oblates of Mary Immaculate who also direct the Marian Shrine at Cap-de- la- Madeleine.

The chapel was open at all hours to anyone who wished to enter, and there were thousands who entered for a Holy Hour of devotion or even shorter periods of meditation. In addition to the general public there were organized groups in attendance and the system of dialogue masses was followed by priests leading in prayer and explaining the various parts of the Holy Sacrifice. This was especially appreciated by the crowds of non-Catholics entering the Coliseum

Five of the Major buildings of the Ottawa Exhibition Association, the center of many of the Marian Congress ceremonies, housed the displays of many of the religious orders in the world.

In 140 booths was shown the work of religious communities of priests, brothers, and nuns in the mission, educational, charitable, and hospital fields.

In his sermon, a high point of the congress, Archbishop John D’Alton, of Armagh, Irish Primate, said that in this age “of moral anarchy” the world had great need of Mary’s example. She was the ideal mother in the Ideal Home.

Today, he said “the home has been invaded by the modern spirit of restlessness and indiscipline which helps to weaken parental authority. ”Then there were the self-styled progressive thinkers who were continually deriding the Catholic ideal of marriage as out of harmony with the trend of modern civilization and who clamored for compassionate marriages, easier divorces, and birth control.

In many countries, the State, against its own best interests, seems bent on joining the conspiracy to hasten the disintegration of the family. It steadily encroaches on the rights and responsibilities of parents in the training of their children and exercises the functions which in God’s design properly belong to them” the Irish Primate declared.

The spirit of cooperation extended to the Catholics of Ottawa by non-Catholics to assure adequate accommodation for the thousands who attended the Marian Congress drew warm praise from authorities of the Congress.

There were only one or two “incidents” during the Congress, these being minor in nature. A one-man picket outside the Marian Congress Centre at Landsdowne Park passed out tracts but did so quietly and was allowed to remain at his post on the street. In one or two small church halls there were anti-Congress speakers, one being known throughout Canada for his consistent anti-Catholic declarations.

The Canadian Capital, while it has a large French-language population, actually has a slightly larger non-Catholic population said Catholic. Mayor Stanley Lewis,

Members of the Board of Control and the City Council, the majority of whom are non- Catholic gave the fullest cooperation as did all merchants and citizens generally.