IWKnights Corner for January 14, 2024

Did you know this about the IW Knights of Columbus? 

“Past Supreme Knight Carl Anderson represented the Order in Mexico City at an international conference held Sept. 1-3, 2023 to mark the 20th anniversary of the Institute of Guadalupan Studies.

The Knights of Columbus is a longtime partner of the institute, which is dedicated to researching and promoting the apparitions of Our Lady of Guadalupe in Mexico in 1531.  Its rector, Msgr. Eduardo Chávez, served as the postulator of the cause for canonization of St. Juan Diego, the Indigenous layman to whom the Blessed Virgin Mary appeared.  Juan Diego was canonized in 2002, and the institute was founded just over a year later, on Sept. 3, 2003.

‘I always considered it a great privilege to cooperate with the work of the institute because of the promise Our Lady of Guadalupe holds for Catholics throughout our hemisphere and the world,’ Anderson affirmed in an address Sept. 1.

The past supreme knight emphasized St. John Paul II’s 1999 apostolic exhortation Ecclesia in America, in which the pope called Our Lady of Guadalupe ‘an impressive example of a perfectly inculturated evangelization’ and the ‘Star of the first and new evangelization’.

He also noted that, upon his inauguration as the 13th supreme knight Feb. 3, 2001, he consecrated the Order to Our Lady of Guadalupe.  Last February, exactly 22 years later, Supreme Knight Patrick Kelly renewed that consecration.  Both ceremonies took place with the Knights of Columbus Board of Directors assembled at the Basilica of Our Lady of Guadalupe in Mexico City.

Past Supreme Knight Anderson further observed that the message of Our Lady of Guadalupe, nearly 500 years after her miraculous appearance on Tepeyac Hill, is a message for our time and for the whole world.

‘As courageous missionaries during the past five centuries have made clear, this ‘wonder’ was not done for only the evangelization of one nation, but for the evangelization of all nations,’ he said.

He concluded his remarks by urging acts of consecration to Our Lady.

‘We can begin where we are,’ he said. ‘Acts of consecration to Our Lady of Guadalupe can be building blocks in constructing the civilization of love. Consecration of individuals and families, but also consecration of Catholic associations, schools, health facilities, charities and even businesses — each according to its own character and each offered as a gift to Mary and through her to her Son’.”

The link to the entire article above can be found in the Friday Flocknotes, IWKnights9981.com/bulletin, facebook.com/IWknights9981 or twitter.com/IWknights.