Marian summit part of rosary novena

A spirit of veneration for Mary is at work during the 2021 Lenten and Easter seasons as the Marian Devotional Movement (MDM) launched a Canada54 National Rosary Novena and Marian Summit on Ash Wednesday.

This 54-day prayer mission continues through April 14.

The campaign’s primary intention is renewing the “Archconfraternity of the Most Holy Rosary through its establishment in Marian shrines throughout the world beginning with Guadalupe, Fatima and Lourdes, modelled after the renewal at Canada’s National Marian Shrine,” Our Lady of the Cape in Cap-de-la-Madeleine, Que., according to the Canada54 website.

Dennis Girard, a co-director of the MDM alongside his wife Angelina, is thrilled with the level of participation to date.

“The renewal began with Our Lady of the Cape back in 2017, and now we have thousands of people from around the world enrolled in (Canada54) praying for the Marian shrines elsewhere,” said Girard.

Canada54 rosary novenas have been staged several times over the past few years, always with a specific intention or two at the centrepiece. The MDM intercessors “recited in excess of 185,000 rosaries” — equivalent to almost 10 million Hail Marys — when a novena was staged in 2020.

The secondary intention is a more Canada-centric quest: continued progress in establishing the New World Sword of St. Michael pilgrimage experience in Canada. This MDM initiative is inspired by seven sanctuaries of the old world that housed a St. Michael the Archangel statue. Linked together in a straight line on a map, like the blade of a sword, these sanctuaries were situated in Ireland, England, France, Italy, Greece and Israel.

MDM seeks to provide a similar opportunity through a pilgrimage journey that stretches from St.-Anne-De-Beaupré, Que., to London, Ont.

“The straight line, like a sword, spans from St. Anne-De-Beaupré, to Quebec City where Cardinal (Gerald) Lacroix is, to Our Lady of the Cape, to Montreal, to Ottawa, then Toronto and ending up at the Michaelite House Retreat Centre,” said Girard. “We believe that post-COVID there will be many who will want to go on pilgrimages, so we want people to decide, ‘let’s do the sword.’ ”