"Let There Be Light" draws thousands to shrine

By Kelsey Cronin | CFP Correspondent

ATTLEBORO – Despite the December evening chill, hundreds of visitors clad in parkas and mittens roam the brightly-lit grounds of the National Shrine of Our Lady of LaSalette. It’s a Monday night, and children and adults clutch steaming cups of hot chocolate while gazing at 300,000 multi-colored Christmas lights strung up across the 10 acres of grounds. Familiar Christmas carols mingle with the sound of conversation and laughter. It’s the shrine’s “Let There Be Light” festival; an event meant to draw pilgrims into the Nativity story and inspire deeper reflection on Jesus’ birth.
“You’re out there in the busy world and you lose sight of everything and then you come here and you find that meaning again,” said Pam Baker, a visitor to the shrine. “I just think that this is a great way to express it and to kind of ground yourself again with the true meaning of Christmas.”
Pam and her husband, Chris, wanted to bring their teenage daughter Abigail to the Festival of Lights to help her rediscover the beauty of the Christmas story.
“You have to stop, you have to read, you just can’t run up and down,” said Mr. Baker. “You’ve got to respect it and just take it in slowly. That’s what we’re trying to do.”
Abigail said she’s glad she came, and her favorite part of the grounds is the Garden of the LaSalette apparition.
From the life-size Nativity scene to the stations of the cross, the sprawling grounds covered in colorful lights provide ample opportunity for prayer.
“My dream is that the lights would really become a means of evangelization,” said Father Ted Brown, M.S. “We get probably 300,000 people here and if we could just figure out how to get one percent of people who have left the church to really consider coming back to the Church, that would be magnificent.”
Father Brown is a LaSalette Missionary priest and the director of the shrine. He says the Missionaries are always looking for new ways to use the lights to draw visitors deeper into their faith.
The Holy Stairs at the shrine are an optimistic indicator that the Festival of Lights is encouraging visitors to do just that. The stairs lead up to a large crucifix at the top of a hill, and pilgrims are encouraged to crawl up the stairs on their knees while saying a prayer at each step. The stairs were bustling on Monday night.
“Those are our boys saying their prayers on the way up,” said Kim Lewis, smiling as she pointed to her teenage sons kneeling in prayer on the steps. Mrs. Lewis and her husband, John, travel from Canton each year to visit the shrine. They stood among the numerous visitors waiting for their families to finish praying.
And when visitors need a break from the biting cold, they can step into the shrine church, which features a large sanctuary and a chapel.
Another notable feature of the shrine is the Rosary Pond. Light-up Christmas trees, bells, and angels line the perimeter of the water, and 26 panels with a reflection relating to the Nativity for each letter of the alphabet provide material to meditate on while walking.
For many, the shrine has been a staple since their childhood. Alba Ortiz, a 29-year-old from Providence, says it’s a tradition to come with her family every year. “I’ve been coming here since I was a child,” she said.
And there are plenty of displays to keep the children interested, including a merry-go-round, a live donkey, and illustrated panels about St. Nicholas and Jesus’ birth.
“The reason why we have the Festival of Lights is because at LaSalette in September 1846, when Mary appeared to the two children, Maximin and Melanie, they describe the beautiful lady with a lot of lights,” said Father Lamartine Eliscar, M.S. He’s at the shrine every night, staffing a table with information about the LaSalette Missionaries for interested passersby. “So wherever you go, wherever there is a LaSalette presence, the theme of light is always there, because that’s the way the children described the beautiful lady.”
Father Eliscar says that the Festival of Lights provides a wonderful opportunity to tell young people about vocations to the LaSalette Missionaries, which is a religious congregation of priests and brothers.
Whatever your reason for coming, you’ll leave the Festival of Lights thinking a little more deeply about the Christmas story. In addition to the daily illuminations from 5 p.m. to 9 p.m., the Shrine offers daily Mass and confession, photos with St. Nicholas, and trolley rides.

– Information about special events can be found online at lasaletteattleboroshrine.org.