Utah parishes to participate in Coast to Coast Rosary

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SALT LAKE CITY — On the Feast of Our Lady of the Holy Rosary, Sunday Oct. 7, a Coast to Coast Rosary will take place all over the United States and in other countries of the world.

The initiative started in 2017, when Catholics in Poland gathered around the borders of their country “to light a spiritual flame, a flame that quickly engulfed the nation in prayer and reparation,” according to the website rosarycoasttocoast.com.

After that a similar event took place in Ireland; the British Isles followed and this year the United States will join the “worldwide effort to combat the Powers of Darkness – the Powers that seek to stifle the Light,” according to the website.

In Utah the Knights of Columbus have embraced the effort and will be celebrating the Coast to Coast Rosary in different parishes and missions throughout the Catholic Diocese of Salt Lake City.

Jason D. Adams, Deputy Grand Knight at Holy Family Parish, learned about the initiative on the Holy League website, a parish-based network of men devoted to the Blessed Sacrament, he said.

Cardinal Raymond Burke is the network’s spiritual guide.

When the request came for people to coordinate local events in conjunction with the national effort, “I signed up to be a coordinator in Utah because I saw no other volunteers,” Adams said. “It was not until recently that I decided to incorporate this event with our Faith In Action programs of the Knights of Columbus.”

More specifically, Adams said he is using the event as an opportunity “to kick off a renewed atmosphere of the rosary to help heal our nation and bring everyone back together through our Blessed Mother.”

The rosary at Holy Family Parish will be recited in the Marian garden on the south side of the church, Adams said. “It is a perfect setting with a statue of the Virgin Mary in a garden and the beautiful Wasatch Mountains as our backdrop.”

Last year was the 100-year anniversary of Our Lady’s appearance at Fatima, but “we are still struggling with many of the same global issues similar to back then” as well as current scandals in the Church, Adams said, and quoted Saint Padre Pio, “The rosary is the weapon for these times.”

The rosary also was credited by the Venetian senators for the victory at the Battle of Lepanto in 1571, and “there is no doubt that we are engaged in battle with evil today and uniting the country and the world behind the rosary is a powerful weapon and the right weapon for these times,” said Adams.

Similarly, at Hill Force Air Base, Stacey A. Yeager, financial secretary of Council 16127, decided to respond to the call after hearing about the event at the State Council. “The rosary is something that has been done to honor our Blessed Mother the Virgin Mary for as long as the Church has been around,” added Yeager, saying that many miracles have come from praying the rosary.

The rosary was recited at the recent Hill AFB Legacy Chapel’s open house, and will be recited after the weekend Masses until the Coast to Coast event.

“I think it is important for Catholics to be united now more than ever,” Yeager said. “We are facing evil forces from external as well as internal factors and we know we can and should trust in the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit to get us through this battle. But more importantly, calling upon our Blessed Mother to intercede for us all and our Church is the best way to invoke the Holy Trinity to protect its flock and continue to keep us on the path to the life ever-lasting, regardless of how corrupt and flawed is man,” Adams said. “If anything should be able to unite us as Catholics, it should be the recitation of the rosary.”

Numerous Knights of Columbus Councils will host Coast to Coast Rosary events on Oct. 7. The rosary will take place at the parish unless otherwise noted. A list follows.

Cathedral of the Madeleine – 10:30 a.m. in English, 2 p.m. in Spanish

Holy Family Parish – 2 p.m.

St. Andrew Parish – 2 p.m.

St. Ambrose Parish – 10:15 a.m.

St. Francis Xavier Parish – 2 p.m. at the Carmelite monastery

St. James the Just Parish – 10:45 a.m.

St. Joseph the Worker Parish – 11 a.m.

St. Olaf Parish – 2 p.m.

St. Rose of Lima Parish – 2:30 p.m.

St. George Parish will participate with a rosary at 2 p.m. at Mountain Meadows Monument trail near Enterprise. This is not organized by the Knights of Columbus.

 Annual Pro-Life Chain

Parallel to the Coast to Coast effort, the annual pro-life Life Chain will take place Oct. 7 from 1 p.m. to 2:30 p.m. at the intersection of 10600 South and State Street in Sandy.

The event “is a peaceful and prayerful public witness of pro-life individuals standing for 90 minutes praying for our nation and for an end to abortion. It is a visual statement of solidarity by the Christian community that abortion kills children and that the Church supports the sanctity of human life from the moment of conception until natural death,” according to LifeChain.net, the website for the national organization.

Sherri Bickley, the Culture of Life ministry coordinator at Saint John the Baptist Parish in Draper, is organizing the local Life Chain. She is thinking of ending the event by inviting those Catholics present to pray the rosary in solidarity with the Coast to Coast event.

”Life Chain is an ecumenical event, so the rosary would be optional, of course,” Bickley said, noting that the rules for Life Chain require that any prayers be recited silently.