Knights Help Organize Vatican Conference on the Church in America

The Knights of Columbus and the Pontifical Commission for Latin America, with assistance from the Institute for Guadalupan Studies in Mexico City, are organizing a conference on Ecclesia in America (The Church in America). The conference will be held at the Vatican from Dec. 9 to 12.

Paying special attention to the important role of Our Lady of Guadalupe in the evangelization of the American continent (understood as the area from Alaska to Argentina), the conference of more than 250 attendees will hear addresses by the Supreme Knight; by Cardinal Marc Ouellet, President of the Commission for Latin America; Msgr. Eduardo Chavez, postulator for the cause of sainthood for St. Juan Diego; and other speakers from throughout North, Central and South America.
The pope will address the group after the opening Mass on Dec. 9.

The conference coincides with the fifteenth anniversary of the Synod for America held in 1997. That synod resulted in Blessed John Paul II's exhortation “Ecclesia in America.”

At a press conference on Tuesday, Supreme Knight Carl Anderson joined with Cardinal Ouellet, Prof. Guzman Carriquiry and Vatican Spokesman Father Federico Lombardi, in addressing the media on the plan for this conference.