My name is Carol Mechler from Troy, IL, in the Diocese of Springfield. The Pilgrim Mother has been rotating in our area since 2016 when Sister Isabel and the Pilgrim Mother Apostolate Committee invited us to crown the Mother Thrice Admirable as Queen of the Three Graces on the Move.

 The Pilgrim Mother Apostolate is a wonderful way to promote the Blessed Mother’s mission from her Schoenstatt Shrine.  Many of our group members were new to Schoenstatt, yet generously and graciously welcomed her into their homes and extended a Place of Honor to her during her visits with them. There is no doubt that the Blessed Mother has interceded much for our families: gifts, graces, and favors in abundance, as well as the three pilgrimage graces of the shrine. A special blessing is that she brings Jesus and inspires great love for him to grow in the hearts of all the family members. 

 Our Pastor, Father Joseph Havrilka, made a trip to the Waukesha Shrine to request a number of small children’s Pilgrim Mother Shrines for our Saint John Neumann Catholic Grade School in Maryville, IL. He brought back enough shrines so that each classroom, lunchroom, and office at the school could have a small Pilgrim Mother. He hosted a special event in the school gym to introduce the shrines to the students, teachers, and faculty and to distribute them to each classroom, lunchroom, and office. He instructed each class to begin their daily prayer with a prayer to the Mother Thrice Admirable of Schoenstatt. He even wrote a special prayer to welcome the Pilgrim MTA to the classroom.

 Reluctantly, we suspended the rotation of the PMTA Shrines from mid-March through June 30 of this year. I kept in touch with our group members through emails in order to continue our study of the Covenant of Lovefor the Pilgrims Movement. Two of our members asked to keep the shrine in their homes for the duration of the suspension. Both were very grateful for this gift. As of July 1, we decided together to start the rotation of the shrines again, being careful to pass only the shrine, physical distance with masks on and hands sanitized. I believe everyone feels blessed by our Pilgrim Mother to again receive her visits which bring the graces we need to restore some sense of normalcy to our lives.

 In preparation for the 70th anniversary of the Schoenstatt Rosary Campaign on September 10 we started meeting weekly through Zoom to pray together the rosary and the novena, A Hero Today. Praying the novena together reminds us of what John did in an heroic way to bring about this important apostolate. He is a great example for us today to continue what he started.  We too can be heroic today for our MTA!