Meet Rose Sierawski and Maureen Andrzejewski. In 2018, these two remarkable women felt prompted by prayer to establish a Rosary Congress – seven days and nights of Perpetual Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament and hourly Rosary – across the Diocese of Lansing. In the first year, eight parishes participated. Last year that number had grown to 20 parishes. This year, Rose and Maureen are praying for double that number. Ave Maria!

“I had asked the Lord, ‘How can I best serve you?” recalls Rose, “And, so, the Lord said: ‘That [a Rosary Congress] is how you can serve me!’ And I thought ‘okay’ and I immediately roped in this beautiful lady into it, Maureen, and said ‘we are going to do this’!” Both Rose and Maureen are parishioners at Saint Michael in Grand Ledge.

This year’s Diocese of Lansing Rosary Congress will take place October 9 – 15. In the days prior, those parish volunteers who are helping to facilitate the Congress will gather at Saint Mary Cathedral in Lansing for Holy Mass offered by Bishop Earl Boyea whereupon they will also receive his episcopal blessing. The theme of this year’s Congress is “Mary, Mother of the Eucharist, lead us to Him!”

“We need to bring people back to adoration of Our Lord in the Sacrament of the Eucharist. The Body and Blood of Christ needs to be revered and respected and glorified,” says Rose, “Each year we have come to know, more and more, that this is something that needs to be done.”

The Rosary Congress began in Poland in 1979, when the Polish people prayed through Mary’s intercession for the coming of Pope Saint John Paul II to his beloved homeland. The First National Rosary Congress in the United States was held in Washington, D.C., in 1988, at the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception.

* To find out more about the Diocese of Lansing Rosary Congress contact Maureen Andrzejewski at ki4357@hotmail.com