'Nation's parish' celebrates 50 years as place of prayer, pilgrimage By Carol Zimmermann Catholic News Service WASHINGTON (CNS) -- The Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception in Washington -- the largest Catholic church in North America and one of the 10 largest churches in the world -- is a familiar place to U.S. Catholics who regard the immense structure as their own. The basilica, which marks the 50th anniversary of its dedication Nov. 20, is not a parish or a cathedral. Instead, it was designated by the U.S. bishops as a national place of prayer and pilgrimage, something the basilica's 1 million annual visitors know well. The book "America's Church," published by Our Sunday Visitor in 2000, describes the basilica as having "no parish community as its own; but rather counts every American Catholic among its members. No single bishop claims it as his cathedral; rather it is the church of all the nation's bishops. ... In every way, the national shrine is America's Catholic church." Read the rest of the article
The Holy Father invites us to pray that we might again learn how to discern, to know how to choose paths of life and reject everything that leads us away from Christ and the Gospel.
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Gianpaolo gives us a behind the scenes look at his upcoming Behold segment on the York University Catholic Chaplaincy.
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