For the third year in a row, the Congregation of Holy Cross hosted a 40 Hours’ Devotion to celebrate the Feast Day of its Founder, Blessed Basile Moreau. The devotion began the night before, 19 January, at 7:30 p.m. UTC. The Holy Cross Generalate in Rome, Italy, and the Shrine of Blessed Basile Moreau in Le Mans, France, were joined by 11 other communities in five other countries to open the devotion at this hour.

The past two years, the 40 Hours' Devotion was associated with the Congregation's celebration of the 150th Anniversary of Blessed Basile Moreau's entry into eternal life. Given the positive response and widespread participaton in the devotion those two years, the Superior General and General Council announced that it would be annual celebration so as to unite the Holy Cross Family world wide in prayer on the Feast Day of its founder.

As in those two previous previous years, around 100 communities and apostolates signed up for at least an hour of Eucharistic Adoration. For the second year in a row, several communities of the Marianites of Holy Cross joined in the devotion, in addition to all 15 jurisdictions of the Congregation of Holy Cross around the world.

The communities participating spanned the Congregation’s age spectrum, from houses of initial formation to retirement communities. There was also a diversity of apostolates from various schools, parishes, and social ministries joining in the time of prayer. That gave a chance for Holy Cross religious to pray with their colleagues, students, parishioners, and other lay faithful.

This year, in addition to praying for local needs, the 40 hours were dedicated to praying for the canonization of Blessed Basile Moreau, vocations to the Holy Cross family, and the fruitfulness of the Congregation’s upcoming Year of Mission and a wider renewal of its missionary spirit and zeal.