By Marlene Quaroni - Florida Catholic

Photography: MARLENE QUARONI | FC

MIAMI SPRINGS | When Father Jose Alfaro asked pre-K students how Jesus would come to Blessed Trinity School earlier this month, one four-year-old said he knew the answer.

“The child raised his hand and said, ‘Jesus is flying here on an airplane,’” said Father Alfaro, Blessed Trinity’s pastor.

But the older kids know that Jesus is present in the Eucharist, that the bread is the body of Christ, said Father Alfaro.

To drive home the point � and mark the World Day of Consecrated Life Feb. 2 � the priest led all of the students in the school’s first-ever eucharistic procession.

As he carried the monstrance along a path of yellow rose petals in the school’s breezeways, students from pre-K through eighth grade followed and sang, “Let Every Nation Bend Their Knees before Jesus Christ.” 

They stopped at two altars: one in the school’s Way of the Cross Garden and another in the Rosary Garden. They knelt and prayed a decade of the rosary at each one.

“The students offered a decade of the rosary in thanksgiving for consecrated life and for vocations to come from Blessed Trinity Church,” said religion teacher Sister Emma Rueda, of the Servants of the Pierced Hearts of Jesus and Mary.

Rain halted a third stop at an altar on the balcony of the Father Joseph Carney Enrichment Center.

“The procession was a way to foster love for the Eucharist among our students,” said Father Alfaro.

Although the church has a weekly Holy Hour at 7 p.m. on Wednesdays, that’s a time when the kids are doing homework or engaged in sports.

The school is planning to have a weekly exposition of the Blessed Sacrament for a few minutes before school starts each day, so the students can attend, said the school’s principal, Maria Teresa Perez.

The Eucharistic procession was a dream come true for Perez.

“I heard about a similar procession at Our Lady of Lourdes School,” she said, noting that “our school theme this year is Christ at the center of academics.

“I thought, what a better way of instilling Jesus Christ at the core of our school than by bringing him to school?” Perez said. “How do you create that core of love for the Eucharist? You start with a young child. We asked Father Alfaro about the possibility of a eucharistic procession and he was 100 percent on board.”

Perez said she hopes the procession will be the start of creating an adoration group among students.

“This was the first step in starting a group called Little Adorers at Blessed Trinity School,” she said. “I learned about the eucharistic adoration when I heard about the program taking place at Our Lady of Lourdes School.”

Melba Remour, a pre-K assistant teacher at Our Lady of Lourdes, said she wants to share the idea with all the schools in the Archdiocese of Miami.

“OLL Little Adorers started in 2005,” she said. 

Her inspiration came from reading a story published on Zenit, an international Catholic news agency whose slogan is “the world seen from Rome.”

“I felt that the Holy Spirit guided me to the website,” Remour said.

After reading the article, she and Our Lady of Lourdes religion teacher Nicole Bondone were “on fire with the idea.”

The story Remour read was about Father Antoine Thomas, a French-born priest living in the United States who started a program called Children of Hope. He developed a eucharistic adoration service using short, simple songs that would dispose children toward quiet adoration.

Luis Perez, 12, saw that everyone was paying attention during the procession through Blessed Trinity School.

“I felt that I was really with Jesus Christ,” said the seventh grader. “I felt his presence. I liked when Father Alfaro blessed us with the monstrance in church. Everyone was looking at it, realizing that Jesus Christ was there.”

Luis said that his mother is a social worker and every Christmas his family brings presents to the needy.

“We say prayers with them,” he said. “It makes me feel good and the expressions on the little kids’ faces are wonderful. They light up. When we help others, that’s when I see the face of Jesus Christ the most.”

Sofia Lopez, 9, a fourth grader, said that she felt Jesus in her heart. “We connect by prayer,” she said. “Kneeling before the Eucharist was special.”