10 for 10 Years for me at the National Shrine

While traveling back from South Carolina on this day 10 years ago, I visited the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception (BNSIC).  I first became aware of this basilica shrine while talking with a ValpU professor who has studied architecture, including sacred spaces.

Over the past 10 years, the BNSIC has become my favorite place to visit outside the Chicago area.

As I celebrate the 10th anniversary of the Kairos experience I had of visiting there for the first time, I share 10 aspects of the space that resonate with me.

1. the Chapel of La Señora de Guadalupe

2. The Pentecost scene

3. the Trinity Dome

4. The display of Papal items

5. Universal Call to Holiness artwork

6. Our Lady Mother of Africa Chapel, with the artwork that displays how Africans have progressed through history from slavery to the realization of goals in the Civil Rights Movement

7. Our Lady of Lebanon Chapel, recognizing the Eastern Catholic Churches

8. Thou Art the Glory of Jerusalem words displayed above the main front doors

9. The Hall of American Saints outside the lower-level Crypt Church sanctuary, with statues including St. Mother Katharine Drexel, St. Mother Elizabeth Ann Seton, and St. Kateri Tekakwitha

10. Attending Vespers in person and through the online livestream has been an enriching, transcendent experience.

As I continue to think back to that first visit and others, I'm sure more aspects of the BNSIC will come to mind, and I look forward to continued visits since I anticipate making regular visits to Washington, D.C.

While it is the largest church in the Western Hemisphere, the side chapels and oratories help facilitate encounters with God in intimate settings through various cultural representations of the Blessed Mother.  And that aspect has helped me appreciate its beauty, just as much as the magnificent liturgies and the grand Upper Church with its artwork.

This place also resonates with me as a shrine dedicated to the Patroness Saint of the United States.  May she continue interceding for the USA so that we may live virtuously and freely.

Blessed be God!

A fellow visitor photographed me as I pose in front of the BNSIC back in May 2023, in the 10th anniversary year of my first visit there.