‘Whispering with God’ at Knock
Australian Jesuit Richard Leonard SJ, a close friend of the Irish Jesuit Province, was one of the guest speakers at the annual novena in the Basilica of Knock, Co Mayo »
The National Novena to Our Lady of Knock took place this year from 14 to 22 August 2024, with daily ceremonies, (Mass, a healing procession, and the rosary) at 3 pm and 8 pm. Workshops were held daily also at 12.45 pm. The theme for this year’s Novena was ‘Whispering with God’….How Do You Pray?’
Fr Richard spoke at both Masses on Thursday 15 August, the Feast of the Assumption. He recounted the moving story of his cousin, a Maryknoll Sister and doctor, who had gone from the US to Chile to work in a parish there at the time of the brutal military dictatorship of President Pinochet.
He shared from her letter to him in which she recounted a sorrowful journey she made to a morgue with a number of mothers from the parish on the Feast of the Assumption. Their sons, some of them parish workers, had been kidnapped and murdered by the military. She accompanied them so they could collect the bodies to bring them home for burial. She said she would never forget the image of one of the mothers cradling her dead son in her arms in the car as she drove them back to their village.
Fr Richard also gave a workshop on ‘Taking a fresh look at Mary’. He outlined 10 key points about her that we can learn from the gospels, noting that the references to her are often so sparse and so familiar that we lose the depth of their meaning. Listen to the full workshop here.
Pat Coyle from Irish Jesuit Communications accompanied Fr Richard to the Knock She spoke with some of the other contributors to the novena including Austen Ivereigh, journalist and biographer of Pope Francis, and Vincentian priest and former chair of Soulwaves Radio ( Religious Network News) Fr Michael McCullough. Fr Michael has just published his first book, With Due Respect : Taking a Second Look at God, Myself and Others, and he spoke to Pat about its contents and how he came to write it.
The Knock Prayer Guides are a group of volunteers who offer prayer sessions and spiritual direction to the many thousands of pilgrims who come to the shrine. They were founded and trained by the Jesuits back in the 1980s and are going strong today with the assistance of Fr Brian Grogan SJ, no stranger to Knock Shrine. Pat met up with the prayer guides on duty and they spoke to her about their ministry and the people who come to their prayer room for guided meditation in the Ignatian tradition, Taizé prayer around the cross, praying the Examen, and spiritual accompaniment.
Thousands of people from all over Ireland and abroad came to Knock Shrine for this year’s Novena. The PP of Knock, Fr Richard Gibbons, and his team worked tirelessly before and during the nine days to make it a special experience for those pilgrims who came in thanksgiving or for solace. They were not disappointed.
