Over a week in Louisiana alone, she and seven other “perpetual pilgrims” traveling the full 1,900-mile St. Juan Diego Route processed with the monstrance on a fire truck in Diocese of Houma-Thibodaux; stopped a train as a stream of Catholics crossed railroad tracks during a procession in the Diocese of Baton Rouge; and, in New Orleans, emerged in a post-Mass procession from St. Louis Cathedral to an unexpectedly quiet French Quarter, their hymns filling a space best known for jazz.
But one moment from weeks ago in Sugar Land, Texas, still stands out in her mind: During eucharistic adoration at a parish, a group of priests and deacons were processing around the church with the Eucharist when a little girl broke away from her family and ran up to a deacon. She pointed to the monstrance.
“What is that?” Elm recalled her asking.
“That’s Jesus,” the deacon said.
“And so she goes to the monstrance, she kisses her little hand, and she touches the bottom of the monstrance and then runs away,” Elm said. “And it was this moment in my own interior where I was aware of, like, ‘I’m that little girl right there.’ … I just started weeping. Because that’s what we’re called to be: where we are the children of God.”
Elm, 25, said her own deepening love of the Eucharist compelled her to take an interest last year in the National Eucharistic Revival and ultimately apply to be — and be chosen as — one of 30 perpetual pilgrims walking the National Eucharistic Pilgrimage’s four routes.
Elm shared her experience of the ongoing pilgrimage June 20 with Catholic journalists and communications professionals gathered in Atlanta for the Catholic Media Conference, an annual gathering of the Catholic Media Association. The Juan Diego Route pilgrims spent June 21-23 in Atlanta after leaving Brownsville, Texas, May 19 and traveling east through Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama. They will continue through Tennessee, Kentucky and Indiana, arriving in Indianapolis for the National Eucharistic Congress July 17-21.
There they will converge with the National Eucharistic Pilgrimage’s other three routes: the western St. Junipero Serra Route, whose pilgrims began in California and spent the week of June 16 crossing Nebraska; the eastern St. Elizabeth Ann Seton Route, whose pilgrims began in Connecticut and recently left western Pennsylvania for northern West Virginia; and the northern Marian Route, whose pilgrims began in Minnesota and are in eastern Wisconsin.
In receiving Jesus’ “tender invitation” to be a perpetual pilgrim, Elm hopes she can help others truly meet Him in the Eucharist. While their journey has taken them to downtown cathedrals and parish neighborhoods, they also have walked in places of suffering, visible and hidden. The first few days of their journey, they walked along the U.S.-Mexico border wall. In Corpus Christi, a eucharistic procession of 1,000 people stopped to pray at a prison. In the Diocese of Victoria, they visited Presidio La Bahia, a Spanish frontier fort that was the site of a famous massacre during the Texas Revolution.
Bishop Daniel E. Flores of Brownsville told the pilgrims multiple times that “Jesus cannot help but pour Himself out” — a phrase Elm said reminded them “what pilgrimage is all about.”
In the Diocese of Biloxi, they walked along Mississippi’s Gulf Coast for three days, and then joined a daylong eucharistic celebration in the Diocese of Mobile, Alabama. From June 17-19, they rested on retreat at the Shrine of the Most Blessed Sacrament in Hanceville, Alabama, which, like the adjacent Our Lady of the Angels Monastery, was founded by Mother Angelica, who launched Eternal Word Television Network in 1981.
The National Eucharistic Pilgrimage’s Junipero Serra Route will pass through the Archdiocese of St. Louis July 5-7. Local events include:
July 5:Pilgrims will pray a Divine Mercy Chaplet at 3 p.m. at St. Charles Borromeo Church in St. Charles, followed by a walk to the Shrine of St. Rose Philippine duch*esne and then processing with the Blessed Sacrament to St. Peter Church in St. Charles for a meal. The evening will include praise and worship, eucharistic adoration and Benediction, and testimony from the pilgrims.
July 6:The pilgrims will do a day of service with the Missionaries of Charity. They will serve food, followed by a 1 p.m. Holy Hour presided by Auxiliary Bishop Mark S. Rivituso and a blessing and delivery of Boxes of Mercy assembled by parishes to refugee families. Bishop Rivituso will celebrate a 5 p.m. Mass at St. Matthew the Apostle Church, with a reception to follow.
July 7:The pilgrims will attend 10 a.m. Mass at the Cathedral Basilica of Saint Louis, presided by Archbishop Mitchell T. Rozanski. They will then process with the Blessed Sacrament to St. Stephen Protomartyr Church for adoration and a reception before crossing into Illinois.
Registration is requested for some of the events. For more information, visitstlreview.com/3vgZwy3.
