Holy Sepulcher Weekend and Jerusalem Our Mother

This week, I’m in Cleveland, where I was promoted to the rank of Knight Commander in the Equestrian Order of the Holy Sepulchre after four years as a member. I trace the order’s roots to the First Crusade and Godfrey de Bouillon, its original mission of protecting pilgrims to the Holy Land, and its 1847 refounding under Pope Pius IX. Today the order exists to support the Church’s daily life and ministry across the Latin Patriarchate, Israel, Palestine, Jordan, and Cyprus, work that is charitable and pastoral, not merely financial. I’ll share Cardinal Fernando Filoni’s moving image of returning to his late parents’ house, still there but no longer filled with the sounds and smells of home, as a way of understanding Christians’ responsibility toward Jerusalem, the Mother Church. And we close with reflections on the Jerusalem Cross and the five wounds of Christ, and pray the prayer to Our Lady, Queen of Palestine, for peace in the Holy Land, asking the intercession of St. Bartolo Longo and Blessed Fulton Sheen.