Our own Abbot Caedmon Holmes has been invited to participate in the Holy Father's visit this week to Washington, D.C. Abbot Caedmon will be among a group of abbots, who are members of the Conference of Major Superiors of Men, in attendance at the Canonization Mass for Junipero Serra at 4:15 p.m. on Wednesday, September 23. Serra was the Spanish-born priest who started nine missions in California in the 1700s. This will be the first canonization to take place in the USA.
The Mass, which will be said in Spanish, will take place on the east lawn of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception, which is on the grounds of The Catholic University of America. The abbots will process into the Basilica with a group of bishops, representing the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, and will sit in the bishops' special section. Abbot Caedmon's ticket was provided to him by the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops.
Pope Francis will be meeting with numerous groups of people, celebrating Mass in three different cities, and addressing world leaders during his first visit to the United States, and the first by any pope since 2008. During his visit, the Holy Father will address a joint session of Congress--the first pope to do so--and the United Nations General Assembly. He will then participate in the World Meeting of Families taking place in Philadelphia.