Atlanta Airport Gets a 24/7 Eucharistic Chapel

Airline employees and vacationers flying by means of the busiest airport on the planet can now spend time within the Actual Presence of Christ.

Archbishop Gregory Hartmayer of Atlanta devoted and blessed his archdiocese’s latest chapel whereas on his solution to catch a flight Monday.

Airline employees and vacationers flying by means of the busiest airport on the planet can now spend time within the Actual Presence of Christ, because of the efforts of the Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta Worldwide Airport’s chaplains and the cooperation of the Archdiocese of Atlanta.

Positioned within the worldwide terminal, the Eucharistic chapel will likely be a everlasting fixture on the airport and is open 24 hours a day, seven days every week.

After receiving approval from the archbishop, the tabernacle was put in in November of final 12 months. However as a result of solely vacationers and airline employees can get previous safety to entry the chapel, the archbishop was not capable of formally bless it till this Monday, shortly earlier than his flight departed.

The chapel was sorely wanted and completely positioned, given the sheer variety of folks arriving from all around the world to make connecting flights, chaplain Father Kevin Peek informed CNA.

The Atlanta airport sees a median of practically 300,000 passengers flying by means of each day, based on Enterprise Insider.

“There’s about 64,000 workers on the airport at any given time,” Father Peek informed CNA. “That’s like a small city or metropolis.”

The chapel has already touched many lives, permitting them to come across Christ in probably the most sudden place, Father Peek stated.

Because the Eucharistic chapel opened, Father Peek has already seen guests weeping and even leaping for pleasure to seek out the presence of Christ within the airport.

The chapel permits airline employees and vacationers to “convey Christ out into their lives and into the world,” Father Peek stated.

One of many best components of getting a Eucharistic chapel, Father Peek defined, is that it permits the airport’s three different Catholic chaplains, who’re deacons, to supply Communion companies when a priest isn’t accessible to say Mass.

“I’m going on the market and provide Mass on Saturday night time and Sunday night time for all of the vacationers to be able to give them two alternatives to make their Sunday obligation. However I can’t get down there each day,” Father Peek defined.

Now, the deacons maintain Communion companies at 11:30am on Thursday and Friday, whereas Plenty are supplied at 4:30pm on Saturday and Sunday.

Blair Walker, head of the Atlanta Interfaith Airport Chaplaincy, labored carefully with Father Peek to make the thought of a everlasting Eucharistic presence on the airport a actuality.

As a result of it’s an interfaith chapel, Walker defined, the airport chaplaincy employees needed to get inventive in designing the area.

“The area is designed for shared sacred use,” Walker informed CNA, “so we don’t need anyone factor in there that overpowers the religion teams which are utilizing it.”

A number of design concepts have been proposed however didn’t work out. Lastly, at some point whereas Father Peek was reflecting within the airport chapel, he realized an space getting used for storage that was coated by frosted glass may very well be used to accommodate the Eucharist.

“We realized, ‘Oh, we are able to take away the frosting off it,’” Walker stated.

Now, simply behind the cleared glass is a tabernacle and a lamp to sign Christ’s presence.

The ultimate design of the chapel serves the twin objective of preserving the interfaith sense of the area whereas additionally defending the Eucharist from any who would probably abuse it.

For Father Peek, whose father, Joseph Peek, was an airline pilot, the undertaking grew to become a labor of affection.

“I did it actually for the airline personnel,” Father Peek stated. “My dad was a business airline pilot and flew out of Atlanta for a lot of, a few years. He had an ideal devotion to Our Lord within the Eucharist.”

Within the chapel’s vestry space, Father Peek positioned a number of footage of his father, certainly one of him together with his mom in entrance of a statue of Our Woman of Fatima, one other of him on the helm of a Boeing 727, and one other reveals his father giving him Communion.

The priest defined, “I put all that there sort of as an announcement to summarize how a lot he included religion and household into his life and in his work and to encourage different aircrew to do the identical.”