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Owatonna KCs Sponsor Pilgrimage to Shrine of Our Lady of Champion
Submitted by LEE JARDINE
The Our Lady of Champion Shrine hosted their third annual Marian Conference May 17 and 18. Owatonna Knights of Columbus Council 945 sponsored a bus pilgrimage to the Marian Conference to provide an opportunity for local parishioners to make the trip and attend the conference. In order to raise the funds to pay for the bus, Council 945 held six Friday shrimp fries at the KC Hall in January and February. The 25 pilgrims made the five-hour pilgrimage with fellowship and prayers along the way.
We were blessed to have excellent speakers at the conference, including Fr. Bill Casey, CPM; Fr. Don Calloway, MIC; and Mother Mary Cathrine, Missionaries of the Word. In addition, we attended the Sunday Pentecost Mass at the shrine chapel with Shrine Rector Fr. Joseph Aytona, CPM. Everyone left the conference with spirits elevated in the love of Jesus, Mary and Joseph.
This is a wonderful event and a great location to visit to recharge your spiritual batteries and get close to Our Holy Mother in prayer. Make time for your own pilgrimage and plan to attend the fourth Annual Marian Conference at the Shrine of Our Lady of Champion in 2025.
The only approved Marian apparition in the United States is a short drive away, just east of Green Bay, WI, in the farming community of Champion, WI. The initial name was the Shrine of Our Lady of Good Help. In 2010, Most Reverend David L. Ricken, Bishop of Green Bay, declared the apparitions “Worthy of Belief” by the authority of the Catholic Church, and in 2016, the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops designated the grounds as a National Shrine. Further, in December 2022, the Vatican Dicastery for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments approved the October 9 solemnity and officially changed the name to the Shrine of Our Lady of Champion as it is customary for approved apparitions to be named after the location of the apparition.
The Shrine has a fascinating story of Our Lady and her encounters with a young lady who immigrated from Belgium with her parents.
Adele Brise had three visits and encounters with Our Lady in 1859. Our Lady told Adele “I am the Queen of Heaven who prays for the conversion of sinners, and I wish you to do the same. You received Holy Communion this morning and that is well. But you must do more. Make a general confession and offer Communion for the conversion of sinners. If they do not convert and do penance, my Son will be obliged to punish them.
“What are you doing here in idleness while your companions are working in the vineyard of my Son?”
"What more can I do, dear Lady?” asked Adele, weeping.
“Gather the children in this wild country and teach them what they should know for salvation.”
“But how shall I teach them who know so little myself?” Adele said.
“Teach them,” replied her radiant visitor, “their catechism, how to sign themselves with the sign of the Cross, and how to approach the sacraments; that is what I wish you to do. Go and fear nothing, I will help you.”
Adele went to work on her assignment and worked with the local farmers to teach their children the catechism. In 1871 the Great Peshtigo fire engulfed eastern Wisconsin in the largest forest fire in our history. The farmers all gathered at Adele’s school/chapel to pray. They walked around the chapel while they prayed the rosary and sang hymns. The fire went around the property scorching the white fence posts surrounding the property. Inside the white paint on the fence posts was perfect. Then a huge rain storm started that put out the fire. Read more at championshrine.org.
Lee Jardine is a member of the Owatonna Knights of Columbus Council 945.
