The Beatification of Fr. Moreau was a great Church event and a personal spiritual journey, as well as a joyful Holy Cross celebration.  I expected the Holy Cross jubilation.  Whenever Holy Cross religious gather, there is a sense of extended family and joy, which the beatification of our Founder could only intensify. What I did not expect was the overwhelming internationality of Holy Cross.  It is one thing to know that Holy Cross is present throughout the world.  It is another to experience it:  Holy Cross religious, men and women, from 5 continents, 4 Congregations, plus another offshoot from the Sisters of the Holy Cross, and at least 18 different nations gathered to celebrate our Founder.  Looking over the sea of faces at the Laigné-en-Belin, I could only marvel that so many men and women from so many different lands found in Father Moreau’s mission and spirit something that touched the Spirit within them.  At that moment, a new appreciation of being part of this family began.  During the three days, as I spoke to different Holy Cross men and women from all over the world, the sense of extended family only increased.  What a model for our world today, that so many people from different cultures and ethnic groups could bond so readily as the spiritual family of a 19^th century French priest.  Truly, although he never left France, Father Moreau had been a man inspired by the Spirit for the universal Church!              It was immediately after Communion at the Beatification ceremony that my heart overflowed and tears came, as I prayed to Jesus to embrace Father Moreau and celebrate with us.  The wonderful music, the inspiring background of the reliquary shaped in the form of a tree below the altar and the huge banner of Father Moreau above it, the multitudes of people — all faded from my consciousness, as I prayed. Great rejoicing filled my soul.  I prayed for all Holy Cross, for family, for friends, for acquaintances, but mostly I just felt a closeness to Father Moreau that I had not felt before, and an earnest desire that I might remain faithful to God’s call as he had remained faithful to his call.  I still relive those minutes in my heart and in mind.  Jesus and Father Moreau touched me in a way I cannot explain, but in a way that has made me different.  How this will play out in my life, I do not know.  I just know it happened, it was real, and it continues to work within me.

            Perhaps that was one of the greatest gifts of the beatification — that so many people experienced this spiritual moment, were touched by the spirit of Father Moreau in some way, and would bring this experience back to the multitude of places and ministries throughout the world.    What a gift to the People of God!  What a needed gift for our world today, broken in divisions and too often filled with despair.  Across cultural, religious, social and national boundaries, we are family, as Jesus, Mary and Joseph, were family, and in the cross of Christ, like Mary standing at the foot of the cross, we find our only hope.