20,000 attend Mass marking 50th anniversary of the Neocatechumenal Way in U.S.

The Mass was celebrated at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn, New York. / Credit: Gregory A. Shemitz, courtesy DeSales Media Group

ACI Prensa Staff, Jul 11, 2024 / 16:30 pm (CNA).

More than 20,000 people participated in a Sunday, July 7, Mass marking the 50th anniversary of the Neocatechumenal Way in the United States. The Eucharist was celebrated by the apostolic nuncio to the U.S., Cardinal Christophe Pierre, and held at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn, New York.

A news brief from the Neocatechumenal Way sent to ACI Prensa, CNA’S Spanish-language news partner, said that the Mass was in commemoration of the 50th anniversary of the 1974 visit to New York by the initiators of this apostolate, Kiko Argüello and Carmen Hernández.

Participating in the Mass were thousands of young people from different parts of the United States who arrived in Brooklyn after having made several days of pilgrimage to shrines and holy places in the country.

“At the end of the liturgy, about 1,000 young men rose up to show they are entering a seminary to begin their preparation for the priesthood; another 1,500 young women stood up to express their desire to give their lives to Christ by entering a convent or as missionaries,” the news brief highlighted.

Although Argüello did not attend the Mass in person, he joined the celebration with a video call from Madrid, Spain.

He recalled how in 1974 he visited several parish priests in New York from a list given to him by the then-archbishop, Cardinal Terence Cooke, and how only the last of the priests he met agreed to start a community of the Neocatechumenal Way.

Pierre’s homily

“On this significant anniversary of the Neocatechumenal Way in the United States, I greet you on behalf of Pope Francis and reaffirm his support and appreciation for the work that the Way does in the service of evangelization,” the prelate said at the beginning of his homily.

Next, the cardinal recalled what the Holy Father told the members of the apostolate in 2018 in Italy: “Your charism is a great gift from God for the Church of our time. Let us thank the Lord for these 50 years.”

After recalling the importance of going out to find “the lost sheep,” the nuncio recalled that “Pope Francis often speaks of opening the doors to people who live in all the situations of moral poverty, to those who have strayed from God, and accompany them back. It is necessary for the Church to open a way back. Is there a way back from addiction, from violence, from despair? God can make a way where it seems impossible.”

“There is a thirst for God that secularization cannot satisfy … This is the mission of the Church: to open the door for sinners to return,” he stressed.

The French cardinal also said that “our failures prepare us for the mission, so that we won’t judge the sins of others: Only those who have experienced the power of grace can show sinners the way back to God.”

Accompanying Pierre at Mass were Cardinal Joseph Tobin of Newark, New Jersey, with Auxiliary Bishops Michael Saporito and Elias Lorenzo; Bishop Robert Brennan of Brooklyn with Auxiliary Bishop James Massa and Bishop Emeritus Nicholas DiMarzio of Brooklyn; and other American bishops, in addition to about 300 priests.

In the United States there are 1,100 communities, in addition to hundreds of families on mission.

There are also nine Redemptoris Mater diocesan seminaries, where 300 seminarians are now preparing for the priesthood and a total of 270 priests have already completed their formation. The seminaries are in Newark, New Jersey; Washington, D.C.; Boston; Denver; Dallas; Brooklyn, New York; Bridgeport, Connecticut; Miami; and Philadelphia.

What is the Neocatechumenal Way?

The Neocatechumenal Way, a July 3 statement notes, was “officially approved by the Holy See in 2008, not as an association or movement, but as a post-baptismal catechumenate, as an instrument to help parishes and dioceses in the work of evangelization.”

The Neocatechumenal Way is present in 135 countries with some 25,000 communities, making a total of more than 1 million members.

This story was first published by ACI Prensa, CNA’s Spanish-language news partner. It has been translated and adapted by CNA.