The Mother Shrine of Africa

SOUTH AFRICA, Sr. Joanne Petersen. On 16 December the Schoenstatt Family of South Africa celebrated the diamond jubilee of their “Mother Shrine of Africa”. The Shrine in Cathcart, Eastern Cape, South Africa, was consecrated on 18 Dec 1949. It is the first Schoenstatt Shrine to be built on the continent of Africa and so it is affectionately known as “Mother Shrine of Africa”. It is built in the semidesert and is in a very rural and missionary area.

The surrounding parishes and parish priests, together with the two Schoenstatt Sisters at the Shrine, had prepared for months for this jubilee. Their hard work was rewarded with a wonderful and grace-filled day. Our MTA really did care because on the day before, when the tents were put up in front of the Shrine, the wind was so strong that it blew some of the poles down twice. When the organisers woke up the next morning, their first questions was: Are the tents still standing?!

They were and the day itself was cloudless, with not a breath of wind. The celebrations started at 10.00 am with a procession consisting of 3 bishops and 25+ priests. The congregation numbered about 800 people, mainly from the local diocese but also pilgrims from East London, Port Elizabeth, Cape Town, Johannesburg and even Lesotho. The main celebrant of the Mass was Bishop Michael Wuestenberg, Bishop of the neighbouring diocese and also apostolic administrator of the Queenstown diocese into which the Cathcart Shrine falls. Bishop Emeritus, Bishop H Lenhof SAC was there together with Bishop A Sithembele of Mthatha. A massed choir consisting of three parish choirs, had practised the hymns for the Mass for a month.

Little stones, little diamonds

The local parish decided to organize lunch for everyone afterwards and so days before they were busy slaughtering a cow, 4 sheep and 50 chickens. What could not be cooked on the day before was cooked in the open veldt next to the Shrine. It was cooked in the traditional way over open fires in big 3-legged African pots.

The celebratory Mass finished at 1.30pm and everyone then lined up for their festive meal. It was heart-warming to see so many people filling the gardens around the Shrine, laughing and enjoying each others’ company and I am sure Fr Kentenich was smiling from heaven.

In 1948, on Fr Kentenich’s last day in Cathcart, in the sermon he gave to the local people of the mission station, he entrusted them with the Schoenstatt Sisters’ secret.

The secret was that the Sisters wanted to build a Shrine in Cathcart. Fr Kentenich urged the people to support the Sisters in this by doing their share through their prayers and sacrifices. When the Cathcart Shrine was being built, they had to use dynamite to break the rock for the foundations. The woman and children would come and break up the rocks into little stones for the foundations.

Sixty years later we can say that those little stones and little sacrifices have truly become diamonds and a fountain of grace welling up from this first Schoenstatt Shrine built on the African continent.