CHILE, Juan I. Alarcon. Last Saturday the 12th of November, the Schoenstatt Family of Chile, was celebrating the blessing of the 18^th Shrine of this country and it took place in San Fernando, in the Valley of Colchagua, about 130 Kms. south of Santiago.

This celebration began on Friday the 11^th with a Vigil led by the Youth. The most important time was the Mass of Blessing celebrated by Monsignor Alejandro Goic, the Bishop of Rancagua and president of the Episcopal Conference of Chile and concelebrated, among others, by Cardinal Francisco Javier Errazuriz. The Schoenstatt Fathers, the Sisters of Mary, Ladies of the Institute, the youth and missionaries of the Pilgrim MTA gathered, on a day of intense heat and sunshine, to take part in this great celebration.

And many came to celebrate: in the first place the blessing of a new Shrine, the irruption of grace in the midst of Chilean grounds and the mere joy that this implied for San Fernando and all the Schoenstatt Family of Chile, a Shrine that was especially filled with the Covenant spirit of 1914, and in a year when the Schoenstatt Youth, decided to renew this Covenant and to seal it for all the Youth of the World in the Original Shrine.

An act that occurred 57 years ago…and an earthquake

But perhaps the most significant thing about this event, is related to an act that occurred 57 years ago, when Father Kentenich blessed the cornerstone of what would be the Shrine of Santa Cruz (60 kilometers to the southwest of San Fernando). On that 20^th of October of 1948, our founder said: "the Blessed Mother wants a willingness to struggle in her school, in her castle; she wants to form knights who will fight with honor until the end of their lives." This is the great task that the Mother and Queen Thrice Admirable of Schoenstatt has proposed, since today, not only in this school, rather, expressly, in all this province and in all of Chile." However, a great movement of pilgrims nor a family ever formed around this Shrine, who would support the fruitful action the Blessed Mother that characterizes our Shrines with their presence or their lives. Time passed, and because of the lack of Capital of Grace and commitment, the Shrine, ended up destroyed as a result of an earthquake, remaining only in ruins.

Father Kentenich’s dream to be fulfilled…some 60 kms. to the East

This new Shrine of San Fernando gathers all its legacy of challenges. And along with the call of Monsignor Goic to be committed and convinced Catholics, of supporting the Church as a continuation of the Work of Jesus Christ; it hopes to be a source of grace and a workshop of sanctity. It hopes to be what the province of Colchagua and all of Chile needs and wants; to fulfill the dream of Father Kentenich, becoming a Holy Marian Land.

Translation: Celina M. Garza, Harlingen, TX, USA

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