New prayer program honors Virgin Mary as 'mother of refugees'

Published: 2005-05-12

NEW HAVEN, Conn. (CNS) -- In the Lenten meditations he prepared for Pope John Paul II and Vatican officials in 2000, the late Vietnamese Cardinal Francois Xavier Nguyen Van Thuan described the Blessed Virgin Mary as the "mother of unity who embraces all of her children dispersed throughout the world." Earlier this year, the Marian devotion of the church and of the Knights of Columbus was especially evident at Holy Martyrs of Vietnam Parish in Arlington, Va. On the feast of Our Lady of Lourdes, Feb. 11, more than 700 parishioners and members of the Knights' Holy Martyrs of Vietnam Council 9655 helped launch a new program honoring Mary under the title of Our Lady of Bai Dau. The centerpiece of the program is a 2-foot-tall statue of Our Lady of Bai Dau. Throughout 2005 and into 2006, the statue will make a pilgrimage throughout the United States and Canada. In communities that will host the statue, local Knights and Vietnamese Catholics will lead a Marian prayer service.

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