Good Morning. My name is Andy Cirmo and I’m a parishioner of St Elizabeth Ann Seton Parish in Naperville. I’d like to express my appreciation thanks to Mike Mortimer and the Real Presence Assn. for their help and guidance when we built our perpetual adoration chapel, and to all Clergy and laity who have made this day possible. I’m honored to have been asked to speak on the topic of Eucharistic Adoration in your parish.

And I’m here today to share my thoughts and experiences with all of you on what has become the most important part of my faith life: "the Eucharist" and "Eucharistic Adoration".

First I’d like to tell you a bit about who I am. I’m the son of Thomas Archangelo Cirmo (how about that for a strong middle name?) a first generation from Italian immigrants. I’m a brother, a husband of 33 years, a father of two children, the last of which was married in June, an empty nester, a grandfather, a lifelong Catholic, a parishioner, a member of a small faith community, a friend, a volunteer, a cantor, a 4^th degree Knight of Columbus, a boss, a businessman, and not last, but first of all...a Eucharistic Adorer.

I know. That’s too much information; but, as I was gathering my thoughts for today’s talk I couldn’t help but think about all the titles and roles we take on in our lives and how they represent relationships with each other. Relationships are ways by which we define our being, our make up, our unique identity. Relationships provide mirrors by which we see ourselves more clearly, and at the same time windows, through which we are clearly seen and understood by others.

Yet our titles and roles both stay with us and change throughout our lives. We gain some, we lose some, some we leave behind and others never leave us. Roles and titles are sometimes seen differently and defined differently by ourselves, versus how others see us and as they get to know us along life’s journey.

Not too many years ago the primary titles and roles for me were husband, father, and executive. Beyond that from my perspective, that was about it. I really didn’t take time to realize the other roles and responsibilities I had beyond this narrow group. Others at that time saw me as hard working, good natured, high energy, with a good family life. But I was pretty straight forward and one dimensional. Because my relationships with family and others were only at the surface at that time there was no mirror for me to see myself in, nor was there any window through which others could really see me for who I was. As I look back, I had no depth, I lacked a center, and although life went on for me with all its rewards and trials and relationships I really didn’t know my inmost self.

My relationships, titles and roles formed by necessity and I was blessed to have a wonderful wife and kids and good jobs. But as I look back from the clear rear view mirror of today with 20/20 hindsight I realize that there was so much more that I could have done and been for my family and for others with the gifts God had given me. I can see relatively clearly now that for years I was trying to define my life all by myself, by taking on roles and titles I wanted to the exclusion of others I needed, and fulfilling what I thought were my responsibilities without myself being centered, grounded, firmly rooted in my faith...In a sense I was a branch without a vine to nurture me.

But transition points occur, and because of a couple of those hinge points where I learned more about myself and my relationships with God and my neighbor that I am here today. Just as life brings titles and roles which we find ourselves constantly trying our best to fulfill what we think they demand; life also brings transition points, hinge points where we move from one plane to another and from one awareness of self to another. It is at these transition points when opportunities to change occur. And there are many, many of these points in our lives. I look back and can see them clearly. Unfortunately we don’t sense these points clearly at the time and sometimes need a nudge from a friend, a spouse, or a life changing situation to realize that these points in life are the guiding hand of God in our lives.

There are a couple of transition points in my life which I will share with you all today, and because of the changes which occurred I am here with you today- giving witness to the power of the Eucharist and God’s incredible gift of mercy and nurturing strength.

To set the stage about the transition points in my adult life, I’d like to share with you my first experience with adoration as a small boy. I remember my Dad doing what he called "nocturnal adoration", which was likely a 40 hours devotion before Eucharist in exposition. He’d always go late at night for his "hour" and I remember him asking me more than once to come along with him. Well, sure I said yes and I wanted to go if meant staying up later...that was a big deal! I also remember as a young boy how long an hour could be; it seemed to last all night! But I also remember clearly watching my Dad pray- as he said his rosary- he’d open his little snap top pouch and on those nights he packed an extra rosary and an extra "tic/tac" mint for me. As my mind wandered and I stared at the candles and the statues in the dimly lit church he’d look down & just hold up his rosary to prompt me to pray. I remember the look on his face as he prayed and I wondered how he could stay awake so long with his eyes closed like that! I really didn’t concentrate or appreciate the miracle before my eyes in Eucharist but just the same it was good to be there. On the way home I asked him what he was praying for and he said "for you" and your brothers and sister and for mom. "I hope you were praying for me too.

Besides my first communion, that was my first experience with Eucharistic Adoration, yet shortly after that as an altar boy I remember being as close as I ever have been to the sacred host and feeling that awe and wonder of what / of who was really there for me just as at my first communion. I had a Catholic grade school and high school education and from time to time I remember considering a number of things like a religious life, tried a few weekends at a couple seminaries and juniorates, but never pursued it. My vocation was to marry and raise a family.

As the years progressed however, and the roles and titles and responsibilities of life overcame me I unfortunately drifted away farther- the awe and wonder of this incredible gift which I had in my heart when I was young was a distant memory. I began to move away from the Church of Christ and became submerged into the pool of worldly pursuit, of more titles, more roles, more responsibilities, just MORE... which consumed me for years. Yes, I went to weekly Mass and communion most of the time but as things were changing in the Church I just went through the motions and watched from the sidelines. Eucharist, for me had lost its awe and wonder and faded to the sidelines of my life.

Now for transition point one: A number of years had passed and we had relocated to a city where Catholics were a very small minority of slightly over 7%, but my wife-who never had wavered in her faith or involvement in the Church had gotten involved in RCIA and one day asked me if I’d be interested in sponsoring a candidate. I remember my reluctance to add this time commitment to take on such a responsibility because I was a Vice President (another title); but she reminded me of how deep my faith roots were, my faith filled upbringing was; and how much I could share with someone who just wants to learn and discover our faith.

Well I said ok and as it happened I was back on track again. As soon as I started, and began to have long talks with my candidate partner, a fire began to burn; that great feeling that I was in the right place doing the right thing. I began to grow again in my faith and even teach a class on the creed. Funny how my concern for time had dissipated

God made time available for me somehow...and very soon I was an extraordinary minister of the Eucharist and as close to the Eucharist as I’ve ever been before, again filled with awe and wonder at this incredible gift in a new and exciting way-that God even allowed me to touch and bring Him to others!

I guess my wife saw all this and kept it in her heart, because she began to gently remind me of my earlier calling to religious vocation I had explored a bit but never pursued. Our diocese had just begun a Diaconate formation program and she just wanted me to know about it. No-I was too busy, maybe someday.

Well we relocated again, this time back to Chicago where we found lots of Catholics and lots of Churches. Our best friends out East had been those we developed from our relationships at church and we wanted to connect in our new community right away, so we dove in to our new parish, with RCIA, to commissions to parish council to K of C to marriage prep, to annulment field advocate to choir to cantor and we’ve made great friends and new family here.

Transition or hinge point two: It was through the Knights of Columbus that I met a group of very prayerful, faith filled women who were already on fire with devotion to the Holy Eucharist. They were pushing for extended hours of Exposition during Fridays in Lent, then on first Fridays. They asked me to communicate this mission and the need for adorers to the K of C council to be sure all hours were covered. Our pastor agreed first for a few hours if there were enough sign ups, then till midnight if there were enough sign ups, then for all night if there were enough sign ups–the Holy Spirit was at work!!

The sign up sheets always filled quickly and there were plenty of adorers–how could this be, we are a young parish with children and activities and both parents working, etc..But it did!!!

There I was, doing and hour of adoration again-always for some reason late at night-I seemed to like that, just like my father had-and it felt great! It had been years since I had focused on Eucharistic presence so closely, so deeply, so personally.

Soon, those wonderful devoted women began to ask for exposition every Friday night, and the sign ups came and well we now knew what the Holy Spirit was guiding us toward. The next step was clear. We were going to ask our pastor if we could explore perpetual Eucharistic Adoration. That’s when things really got exciting...as a representative of the K of C (the men’s organization of our parish) I was asked to join this group of faith filled prayerful people in the exploration and development of a plan for a perpetual adoration chapel. Our pastor again showed his support- but reminded us that this was to be a lay movement and we’d have to pull together a plan and sign up enough parishioners before he’d approach the bishop for permission for perpetual exposition.

That’s where Mike Mortimer and the Real Presence Association came in. His help was indispensable. He waked us through the process of adoration chapel development step by step with guidance, materials and support. Our two basic challenges were at this point to develop enough interest (sign ups for 350 to 400 are needed to cover all hours and have alternates available). The Real Presence start up manual was indispensable with guidance of how to solicit, what forms to use, what steps to take and what to say, and provided materials and communications needed to make it happen.

WE MET, WE WORKED AND WE PRAYED

The second basic challenge was where to locate our chapel. It is important that a chapel be on the parish campus, but in a space which is conducive to private devotion without interruption, and can not be visible from where Mass is being said. And that entry and exit from it can happen without disturbing liturgies going on in the Church and visa versa. So I together with the original group and now with some additional members who understand space and construction and logistics began space studies in close communication with our pastor... We started with tours of adoration chapels in the surrounding communities during which we visited, took notes on what we liked and needed and interviewed directors from other parishes. We made our lists, reviewed them with the committee and with our pastor with a dream plan for a fully developed chapel, and with a list of minimum requirements.

WE MET, WE WORKED AND WE PRAYED

We also asked every organization in the parish to pray with us that the Holy Spirit would continue to show us the way. Try as we might we couldn’t find a reasonable way to use the church or its meeting rooms (already maxed out with usage from our parish ministries), AND we had no money to work with! We couldn’t ask the entire parish to fund this with all the expenses currently being addressed and ministries funded.

WE MET, WE WORKED AND WE PRAYED

And explored every option. It so happened that there was a garage next to the parish offices just being used for storage so with our pastor’s ok we began to explore how to convert it and add insulation heat, power, air conditioning, bathrooms, etc. But everywhere we turned the costs were so great and the layout so prohibitive that just wouldn’t work. What to do...it was just then that our pastor pointed out that part of the parish offices themselves at the edge of our parking lot was already a converted garage, being used as office space which was underutilized and could be a potential site. We were excited, it could work! It had its own heat and air conditioning already and was connected to a hallway to access the parish office bathroom. This could work! But how? Drawings were made and the cost came in at between 30 and 40 thousand dollars!

WE MET, WE WORKED AND WE PRAYED

Let’s call this the first miracle of our new chapel. Literally one day after we had the final cost estimates in hand one of the committee members came up to me at Saturday morning mass and with tears in her eyes and a big smile said that our associate pastor had received a call from a parishioner who wished to remain anonymous, stating that they would like to make a donation for the construction of the chapel with funds not to exceed 40 thousand dollars!!! The exact number of our high estimate to make our dream come true! The Holy Spirit had been working overtime that day. With this gift this great space was made available, and with the labor for demolition and construction donated by our Knights of Columbus and men’s Cursillo members and others we were on our way.

WE MET AFTER MASS, AND PRAYED THANKS FOR THE WONDROUS GIFTS GOD HAD GIVEN US.

Our parish sign up Sunday was a roaring success with over 400 parishioners signing up in less than two weeks. All their names on a larger than life poster with all hours of the week filled in were very impressive indeed. Virtually every slot was filled!!! The Holy Spirit continued to be with us as we built and dedicated our Pope John Paul II Eucharistic Adoration Chapel which has now been in continuous operation 24 hours a day for over three years. The blessings showered upon our adorers and our parish have been inestimable. We have filled 5 large oversized 3 ring binders with thousands of pages of petitions and favors granted since its operation began.

Built entirely by our parishioners, our chapel is everything we dreamed it would be and more. I’ll never forget the smiles, camaraderie and sense of holy mission all those men shared as day after day they showed up with their tools; when wives and friends showed up with lunch and drinks and when parishioners with gifts in decorating stepped up to finish, decorate and furnish our chapel.

From that point forward, for over 400 adorers and for the team, the effects of bringing the Eucharist to the center of our faith lives has been amazing. And the effect on our parish itself has certainly been tangible. Even during the difficult times our Church has been through in the years since our chapel was built I can happily give personal witness to many more people attending both our daily 6AM (from an average of 6 to 40) and 8:15 AM Masses, Sunday donations maintaining pace with budgeted needs, a strong start to the support of our new Catholic School "All Saints Academy", opening this fall, and a continued addition of mew members to all our parish ministries, commissions and committees; the start up of new ministries such as the Elizabeth Ministry, Health Care Ministry, Catholics Returning Home Ministry, vocations to the priesthood and diaconate, start up of a new evangelization committee, revitalization of charismatic prayer groups, life in the spirit seminars and continued growth of our Cursillo and K of C programs.

About a year after the successful opening of our chapel the chapel leadership committee felt called to do more to encourage Eucharistic Adoration far and wide to parishes in the Joliet Diocese, so again we met, we worked and we prayed. The result was a Eucharistic Adoration Chapel Workshop attended by over 80 people from at least 12 parishes. We offered our help and shared our experience. Since that workshop, with the help of the Real Presence Association three of the parishes who attended have either extended their adoration hours or opened their own chapels.

Our Eucharistic Adoration chapel has helped to bring the Eucharist to the center of our parish faith life. Not only now do we have the Eucharist to receive every day at Mass, but we also have a place away, a place to go and be in His physical presence, to thank Him, to praise Him, and to ask Him for help in our daily lives. It’s a place away, a place away from the distractions and complications and business of our daily lives. It’s a place away - away from the daily pulls of life where we can re-center ourselves- an extension of the Eucharistic experience and communion we receive at Mass.

In my life, re-centering on Eucharist ahs helped me rebalance and refocus when I need it. It’s a place away where even separate from my committed hour I find myself stopping in for 10 minutes to say Hello Jesus, thanks for today, or Jesus please help me with this or that, or calm me and bring me peace, or help me make this or that decision, or help this or that person in their time of trouble. Our chapel and the refocus of my life on the Eucharist have restored that awe and wonder I once had as a young boy. It has helped me cope, and hopefully helped me be and bring Eucharist to others. You know, I have to say it out loud. It’s great to be a Catholic and to have the celebration of Eucharist and communion at Mass and to receive Christ’s nurturing grace through His sacraments. To have Christ Himself continuously present, not only in us and in our relationship with Him in the body of Christ as we all are part, but also in physical presence for us. To receive His Body and Blood, and also to be able to be alone with him in the deepest way possible in His physical presence is a gift we Catholics should always be so thankful for.

During the planning process for our chapel and during the construction I became very aware of the calling again that I had heard in echoes a couple times before in my life and I answered this time. So now as I look forward to my ordination as a deacon in September ’07 for the diocese of Joliet (yes I’m proud to say that I was one of Bishop Kaffer’s students) I’ll be fulfilling a lifelong dream to serve my brothers and sisters in a special way and in a special closeness with the Eucharist. I look back on my younger years and how my father brought Eucharist to me and into my life. In my years away from that relationship with the Eucharist I now look back and see that His incredible gift was and is always there, and how my wife was Eucharist to me as she ever so gently led me back to the center. Now, over these last three years re-centering my life on the Eucharist through daily Mass and adoration there’s an energized and refreshed mission to spread the good news of salvation- to urge everyone to re-center their lives on Eucharist.

The blessings which can happen when so many are praying in the presence of God in the Eucharist is amazing. I can’t tell you how many small and large miracles have happened in our adorers’ lives since our perpetual adoration began but as I talk with many adorers about their lives since starting adoration, there is a common thread. Their lives are blessed with a comfort beyond what they have ever known- a comfort that God is with us and remains with us in good times and bad to offer His boundless love and mercy.

The comfort that our chapel brings to our parishioners, and to parishioners from other parishes who visit is very tangible. Any hour of the day or night that I drive by there are cars parked outside; before work and after work a number of people are now dropping by to say a quick prayer to get centered before before their day or at the end of their work day to unload the stress. There are parents with children, teens (alone or with others), people with pain and sorrow, people with thanks and praise, all visiting this Place Away — a place to be quiet and know that He is God and that we are held in the palm of His hand.

In our Chapel ministry we’ve even taken the months of the year and made prayer cards for a special cause each month, for Fathers, Mothers, Children, Teens, Grandparents, Single Parents, Singles, to celebrate marriage, Lent, Easter Advent, Easter, Christmas. Our chapel lending library has grown into a great collection, our Elizabeth ministry table has gotten large numbers of people praying for mothers, women and couples in need of support. And soon we will begin to ask all 350 of our adorers to pick a name or two from a list of all diocesan priests, seminarians and deacons...to pray for them at every hour of their adoration ongoing - for encouragement, support, and continued graces for their spiritual well being. The adoration community can become a powerful intercessory prayer group in your parish community.

To the lay people here today, I urge you to go back to your parishes and look at ways to reinvigorate Eucharistic adoration in your parish; start with first Fridays, then extend the hours, and then go for all night, then for every weekend, then for perpetual. Form a prayer group and spread the word; invite the Holy Spirit to carry you on this mission. The year of the Eucharist was just the beginning. Make this last year the beginning of your faith life newly centered on the Eucharist. Continue to make progress made in these next 12 months to re-center our faith in your parish by returning to your parishes with an even stronger desire than before to invigorate Eucharistic Adoration. Find others with the same passion, meet and pray. Continue to strive to center your lives on Eucharist and to be Eucharist to others. Christ, since the beginning, has created us to be with Him. Invite Him in — and find a special place - A Place Away as he did as often as He Himself went away into the desert to pray and be alone with the Father.

The Real Presence Association can provide the tools you need to make it happen. Explore it. It may take some time, but we all know God works in His time not ours.

To the clergy and magisterium of our Church I say thank you. Thank you for helping us rediscover the awe and wonder of God’s real presence in Eucharist and helping us bring this to the center of our faith lives through the Eucharistic celebration, Eucharistic exposition and the sacraments. Help us stay committed to this centering influence in our lives through continuing to bring and to be Eucharist to us through your ministry.

We’ve found that the closer we get to Christ in the Eucharist, the more we want Him in us...to be with Him. When we adore each week and pray in the presence of the Eucharist we can’t wait until the next opportunity to receive Holy Communion. Our chapel has helped center our personal and parish lives on the Eucharist as the foundation of our faith lives all day every day; and He will do the same for your parish too. I can’t urge you strongly enough to go back to your parishes and pray- that if you already have Eucharistic Adoration that more people will be open to the opportunity to set aside an hour - and if your parish does not have Eucharistic adoration or very few opportunities for exposition of the blessed Sacrament that the Holy Spirit will move people to meet, work and pray that it may happen.

In our lives, our adoration chapel, this "Place Away" for quiet worship has been a special place where we have pitched our tent for Him

...for it is good to be here.

In closing I’d like to read a poem which reflects my experience and which I hope can inspire you to keep centering your life on the Eucharist: