Outdoor Processions Take Catholics onto the Streets

About 250 Catholics joined in a Corpus Christi procession through the streets of Washington on June 1. Organizers believe that the procession was one of the first major outdoor Eucharistic processions in the Washington area in many years. The marchers walked about one mile from Annunciation Church on Massachusetts Avenue to St. Thomas Apostle Church on Woodley Road, N.W. A smaller procession took place earlier in the day near Our Lady of Victory Church in northwest Washington.

Corpus Christi celebrates the Holy Eucharist, the Christian ritual which commemorates the last supper of Jesus. The procession was led by a priest holding a monstrance, a vessel which contains the Eucharistic bread, believed by Catholics to be the body of Jesus Christ. "The Eucharist is the center of our faith," one member of St. Thomas Apostle told Catholic Standard. "It isn't right to keep our Lord within the four walls of the church. We have to bring him out so he can transform the whole society."