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FAITH
Chapel offers one-on-one with Christ
BY DAN WHISENHUNT
danwhisenhunt@reporternewspapers.net
The cards speak. They’re often the
only voices in the chapel.
Little index cards, penciled with
prayers and left in the Cathedral of
Christ the King’s Blessed Sacrament
Chapel, speak of thankfulness, help
lessness and hope.
“Dear God,” one card said. “Please
give me hope that I will find the right
job.”
The Cathedral of Christ the King
practices adoration, an extended mo
ment of quiet prayer before a golden
vessel holding the Eucharist. Catholics
believe the Eucharist, a thin circle of
unleavened bread blessed by a priest,
is the physical presence of the body of
Jesus Christ. Volunteers called guard
ians pledge one hour or more of their
time each week so someone always sits
with the Blessed Sacrament.
“Fundamentally the thing that
makes us unique as Catholics is that
we don’t believe that it’s the appear
ance of bread only, but it is actually Je
sus himself,” said Bernadette Flowers,
stewardship director of time and talent
for the Cathedral. “When you come to
the adoration chapel you get to place
yourself in the presence of Jesus and
tell him what’s
going on with
you, ask his ad
vice, ask for his
healing, ask for
his understand-
• >5
mg.
Members of
the public can
visit the cha
pel from 6 a.m.
to 10 p.m. It’s a
tiny room con
verted from a
baptistery be
hind the church
altar. It smells of
melting wax and
burned incense.
Some cha
pel visitors want
solace from At
lanta’s too-busy
pace. Others
look for answers.
Guardians say
some of the most
successful-look
ing people in Atlanta come to tell Je
sus that, on the inside, they’re falling
apart.
“You see people walk in there and
they’ve got on expensive suits and ties
and they look like they’ve got their
whole world all together,” Flowers
said. “Sometimes you read those in
dex cards and they say, ‘Jesus, help me.
My wife doesn’t love me anymore’ or
‘Jesus, help me. My children are on
drugs,’ or ‘Jesus, help me. My business
is failing.’”
While adoration is practiced at lo
cal Catholic churches in Brookhaven,
Sandy Springs, Buckhead and Dun-
woody, the Cathedral’s chapel offers
“Perpetual Adoration,” meaning a
guardian is there 24 hours a day, sev
en days a week. The Blessed Sacrament
Chapel at the Cathedral is also called
the Perpetual Adoration Chapel. Ac
cording to the Roman Catholic Arch
diocese of Atlanta, there are six metro
churches offering perpetual adoration.
Flowers said praying in the presence
of the Eucharist offers something more
than quiet prayer at home or a Sunday
morning Mass.
“Dear Jesus,” a card said. “Please give
me the strength to hear your will.”
Cathedral of Christ the King opened
the Perpetual Adoration Chapel in
1993, said Keri Allen, associate direc
tor of evangelization and adult educa
tion. Adoration is a Catholic tradition
hundreds of years old, but it had fallen
out of common practice when the cha
pel opened, Allen said.
She said opening the chapel was the
idea of Rev. John Francis Donoghue,
the archbishop of Atlanta from 1993 to
2004.
“There were fewer Catholics that
understood about the true presence of
Christ in the Eucharist,” Allen said. “So
it began as an awareness to Catholics but
also an opportunity for them to pray not
only for their own personal needs but
for the universal church as well.”
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22 | APRIL 19— MAY2,2013 | www.ReporterNewspapers.net