Dr. Hahn speaking at Miracullous Medal Shrine on evening of 9/24/15

Commentary by Susan Brinkmann, OCDS

The other evening I had the great privilege of accompanying Dr. Scott Hahn from the World Meeting of Families to the nearby Shrine of the Miraculous Medal in Germantown. During the drive there, he shared his thoughts and impressions of the World Meeting of Families.

“On the one hand it’s very inspiring; on the other hand it's overwhelmning to see this many people. And it’s not just the numbers. It’s the range of Catholics who were from Nigeria, the Philippines, Europe, Australia.  I didn’t realize what a draw [the World Meeting of Families] would be for Catholics around the world."

The number of attendees was indeed staggering and several event speakers commented on how breathtaking it was to address an audience that could easily reach 10,000 people. Anyone who attended didn't need to be told that the 2015 WMF was the largest in the history of these meetings. It boasted of more than 17,000 registrants from more than 100 countries . At any given time, while walking through the expansive halls of the Pennsylvania Convention Center, you're bound to hear a multitude of languages and see the colorful costumes of people from one side of the globe to the other.

“When you attract a crowd this big with Pope Francis and all the Cardinals and bishops and priests and sisters and lay people, it’s not just that we’re putting on display to the world who we are and what we’re about. I got the sense that it's a powerful renewal of our own identity. It’s not just a political show of force through numbers; it’s a spiritual experience of solidarity. Not only clergy and laity, but America, Australia, African and European – just a real sense of catholic solidarity - what it’s like to be part of a family that is worldwide and divine.”

Magnificent side altar at Shrine of Miraculous Medal

Later that evening, he spoke to a packed church about the role of family in our salvation history.

“I would like to propose to you that the family of God is the key to Christianity,” he said.

“When God came to save us, He made salvation something that was inseparable from family life. It was made manifest in the family from the very beginning with the Christmas story.”

He went on to explain that this is a story that has a rather unconventional hero who is “not a warrior, not a worldly convert, not an individual, but rather a family. The details of the story always lead us back to this. We all know it’s about Jesus, but he’s in swaddling bands and someone had to do the swaddling. So we had a mother and a child. We have St. Joseph. We have a household. We have the holy family. We have the nucleus of what will become this universal Church we call the family of God.

"Salvation itself finds meaning for us not just because of the fact that we’re pardoned and acquitted as criminals but rather that we’re adopted as sons and daughters. Salvation arrives to us by way of the family.”

Many of the people in the audience were attendees at the World Meeting of Families who took advantage of opportunities to visit the many national shrines located in and around the city of Philadelphia. These include the National Shrine of St. John Neumann, the Saint Katharine Drexel Mission Center and Shrine, the National Shrine of St. Rita of Cascia, the Naitonal Shrine of St. Gianna Molla, and the National Shrine of Our Lady of Czestochowa.

The Archbdiocese of Philadelphia has 219 parishes serving more than 1.4 million faithful.

Philadelphia is a great place to be a member of the family of God!

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