Eucharistic pilgrims learn to find grace in taunts of protesters
"Since the protests have started, the processions have become like walks to Calvary with Jesus."
This year’s National Eucharistic Pilgrimage started out quietly enough.
The pilgrimage began with a May 18 Mass of Thanksgiving to kick off the five-week trek from Indianapolis to Los Angeles.
While last year’s National Eucharistic Pilgrimage included four different routes, coming from each coast of the country and converging in Indianapolis for the 10th National Eucharistic Congress, this year’s trek included just a single route, and drew less media attention than last year’s as it began.
But within the first few days of the pilgrimage, participants found they were attracting attention from an unexpected source – groups of loud, and sometimes aggressive, protesters who popped up along the route.
Pilgrimage organizers said the protests were spearheaded by members of the Church of Wells, a small fundamentalist Christian group based in Texas, which criticizes Eucharistic adoration as contrary to the Christian gospel.
The group, which has a history of disrupting Catholic and Christian events, has been described by former members as a cult. In 2015, six members of the Church of Wells were arrested after disrupting a Christian service at Joel Osteen’s church.
The protests started small, with two or three people.
But by the time the pilgrimage arrived in Tulsa, Oklahoma last week, the protests had grown larger.
Protesters jeered into megaphones at the pilgrims, yelling, taunting, and trying to start arguments.
What started out as an annoyance for the pilgrims became a real trial as time went on – particularly for the perpetual pilgrims, the eight young adults traveling the entire pilgrimage route.
The pilgrims said the chants and rebukes, blaring loudly and unceasingly through a megaphone, put them on edge. They felt disoriented.
“Whenever you heard them, there was always that moment where we all sighed and thought, ‘Do they have to do this?’” perpetual pilgrim Cheyenne Johnson told The Pillar.
“We all want a really peaceful and beautiful pilgrimage where we are able to pray and talk to people as we are walking and not have to worry about things.”
Another pilgrim, Ace Acuña, described hearing the protesters’ ongoing chants as a “dizzying” experience.
“Tulsa was the first time the protests really escalated. It was a four-hour procession and you had to hear the megaphones for all four hours walking alongside us,” Acuña said. “It was dizzying. You just asked, ‘Lord, why won't you let it stop?’”
The protests continued from Tulsa to Oklahoma City.
There, perpetual pilgrim Frances Weber said there was a moment where the noise and unceasing shouting just became too much.
She couldn’t handle it any more. She had to step away from the procession and sit down.
“I just needed to step out for a minute to regroup. While I was sitting there praying for a minute, I started praying about the spiritual reality here and how the Evil One is at work in these protests and I don't want to let him win,” Weber told The Pillar. “That realization has really fired me up for the last week.”
Seeing a spiritual dimension in the shouts and jeers strengthened Weber’s resolve.
But the harassment was still taking a toll on the pilgrims as the protesters followed them from city to city. The protesters showed up in Dallas. And in Fort Worth.
At times, the pilgrims were being taunted by name.
By Fort Worth, the protesters were having a serious effect on the perpetual pilgrims. This impact factored into a decision made by the National Eucharistic Congress to have the perpetual pilgrims sit out of two public processions in the Diocese of San Angelo.
For organizers of the pilgrimage, the protesters also raised questions of security.
The persistence of the protesters raised the possibility that they might follow the pilgrimage all the way to Los Angeles.
Responding to this possibility, the National Eucharistic Congress’ security team held additional meetings with the dioceses on the pilgrimage route, to help coordinate additional safety measures for diocesan events.
When Bishop Michael Sis heard that the aggressive protesters might follow the pilgrims to San Angelo during their June 7-10 stop in his diocese, he took action.
The bishop contacted the diocesan lawyers and looked into the Texas penal code.
Sis said the law prohibits disturbing other people’s worship – either physically or verbally. He also said he believes that the protesters’ actions could constitute a hate crime.
“It's disturbing our worship in an aggressive, obnoxious way that's contrary to our beliefs,” he told The Pillar. “It is singling us out because of our religion. I think that can constitute a hate crime.”
Sis then shared his legal findings with local law enforcement, asking them to enforce these laws if any protests took place during the pilgrimage’s three days in the Diocese of San Angelo.
Local police agreed to increase their presence at both public and private events, ensuring that there were multiple officers walking ahead, within and behind the procession.
Then Sis made one more phone call – this time to local Catholic Daniel Garza.
Garza is the leader for the local chapter of the Knights on Bikes, an offshoot of the Knights of Columbus which seek to serve the bishop and the Church while riding motorcycles.
Garza recruited some of his members to provide an additional level of security for the processions.
Ten men traveled with their motorcycles from Odessa, Texas to Abilene and San Angelo to volunteer at the processions.
Garza clarified that their goal was not to get into physical altercations – and in fact, he specifically instructed members to avoid engaging with any protesters that may show up.
Instead, they were there as an additional physical presence, and ready to alert the proper authorities if there was a problem.
“Our weapon is the rosary,” Garza said. “We want to bring peace into this world,”
The Knights on Bikes stood guard at the doors during Mass and walked alongside the procession as it wove through the streets of downtown, praying as they went.
Ultimately, though, the protesters never showed up in San Angelo – the first stop on the route without them after 10 consecutive cities where they had been present.
They reappeared at the next stop along the route, El Paso. But they didn’t show up in Gallup.
Johnson told The Pillar that not knowing what to expect was nerve-wracking.
And Weber said the anticipation of the protesters was tiring.
But, she and the other pilgrims said they came to recognize the protesters as a cross to carry along the way – and to unite to the suffering of Christ, who also endured taunting and harassment on the Way of the Cross.
“It has been a great gift to surrender this cross,” Weber said. “There is more grace than I would have ever anticipated in this struggle.”
Other pilgrims agreed.
“Since the protests have started, the processions have become like walks to Calvary with Jesus,” Acuña said.
“It is beautiful in a way because you get to gaze upon our Lord, just like Mary did on the way to Calvary. So many things from scripture have been made real, like ‘pray for those who persecute you’ or ‘blessed are you when they utter insults against you.’ But also that call to ‘forgive them for they know not what they do’.”
The pilgrims said they have relied on one another in tough moments, and the shared experience has drawn them closer.
“My team are the people who are doing this with me day in and day out, who are hearing the same things I'm hearing, having the same experience," Weber said. “The protests have led to a really sweet bond between us, because these seven other people are the only ones who know what I'm experiencing in a pretty intimate way right now.”
Weber said there have been moments where she has even been able to find humor in the familiar chants.
“It is laughable at this point,” she said. “They were saying the same things…We get it. You have the same five statements and five arguments. You could get more creative if you wanted to.”
Every night, the pilgrims share as a team their reflections from the day.
These conversations help them remember to keep Christ at the center of all of their interactions - even with protesters.
“We just reminded ourselves why we are here,” said Johnson. “We are here for Jesus, so we must just fix our gaze on him.”
I like hearing about what the bishop did to ensure safety for the procession in his area. That was good thinking on his part. Police presence and volunteer bikers would tend to deter the kind of bullies who pick on a soft target.
The monotony of the protesters reminds me of a bit in Perelandra.
I read something a few weeks ago about the way to heal the wounds and offenses committed against us is to pair them with meditations on Christ's Passion. Which is exactly what the Processors are doing. Kudos to them.