A New Kind of Way

USA, James VanMatre. Twelve pairs of old tennis shoes hit central-campus pavement of the University of Texas at Austin. As their soles slapped the steps leading down from the UT Tower, the inscribed words of “The Truth shall set ye free” at their backs, a 3 PM Texas sun blazed at their necks. Twelve pairs of feet treaded across the south lawn towards the Capitol building downtown. A few pairs of hands bore maybe a visual Capital of Grace, a flag flying bright blue and yellow, or even a beloved image set against hard wood. And single every heart carried within it a destination such as Austin has never known before.

Addie Roy is the land that She has claimed for Her own, for the Austin Family. A year ago on Good Friday, we as university men made the journey to Calvary with Her in a way we never had, trekking ten miles across campus and into the heart of downtown, weaving our path through Austin hill country to reach the place that we knew to be home.

But that was then

Now, there are maybe a hundred pairs a feet gathering at St. Mary’s Cathedral, a few blocks from the UT campus, to begin this unfamiliar journey to a soon-to-be-known future place of grace.

To walk Christ’s journey of Calvary truly with His Mother and to Her home, where we hope that Her throne of the Austin Schoenstatt Shrine will soon be erected. A group of university men and women with sodalist-spirit inspired families, priests, and out-of-town pilgrims (even students from a rival school) to partake in His Way.

And this is now

Our Good Friday walk, or Passion Play and Pilgrimage, became not only a beautiful way to unite our sufferings and sacrifice to Christ’s during His darkest hours, but also an incredible way for the Schoenstatt Family of Austin to reach the greater Catholic community, to do what Schoenstatt’s Father and Founder always intended—to renew the Church.

Thanks to the creative initiative of one of our university women, we got to experience original, monologue-based Stations of Cross at various stop points imbedded throughout the Austin downtown and Westlake route.

These Passion characters such as Simon of Cyrene, Veronica, and John the Beloved, who accompanied us the entire pilgrimage, shared their deep, interior reflections about His Way, which allowed our walk to be a moving and reverent experience for all to see. We finished this journey with Christ’s Mother at Addie Roy, the future shrine land, by living out the last moments of His Death on the Cross, the last thoughts of the Passion characters, and the pieta. The community stayed afterward for the Good Friday liturgy of the Adoration of the Cross just outside the wayside shrine overlooking the Texas hill country.

Called for a New Evangelization

Blessed Pope John Paul II and Pope Benedict have called for a New Evangelization. That’s what we, the Schoenstatt Family of Austin, have strived to bring: a Passion Play and Pilgrimage (a soon-to-be Austin Family tradition) for the entire diocese that’s totally present to the city but with a unique flavor and deep interior life. We trust that Schoenstatt is this very answer to the Holy Father’s call, a gift given to us by the Mother that wants the world to be Her Son’s. Our only hope is that with this new and bold and youthful Capital of Grace, the MTA will give us the grace to make our Shrine, Bethlehem, Cradle of Sanctity a reality come this October 18^th, 2012, with the Bishop’s blessing to really fulfill the Year of the Shrine Current.

And who knows what we’ll conquer, what miracles of grace She’ll work, once we build Her Shrine?