A 40-foot white cross has stood above millions of people for over four decades in Philadelphia. Now, it rises above Malvern Retreat House, and leaders there plan on bringing a million more whom they hope will find a faithful reminder as they gaze upon it.
The cross that stood high above Logan Square in Philadelphia as Pope St. John Paul II celebrated Mass on Oct. 3, 1979 today stands at a new outdoor veneration platform on the Chester County retreat center’s Great Lawn.
Crews moved the now-renovated cross from its former location at the edge of the previous campus of St. Charles Borromeo Seminary on City Line and Lancaster Avenues, where it had stood since 1979.
In his prayer to God during the dedication of the cross before the June 22 Mass at the Blessed Carlo Acutis Shrine at Malvern Retreat House, Archbishop Nelson J. Pérez said the cross “recalls for us the fullness of your abiding love and leads us to trust in your mercy.
“May this image of the cross, an image marked by great history in the Archdiocese of Philadelphia and intimately connected with the visit of Pope John Paul II to our city, invite all who look upon it to be transformed into the likeness of Christ, your son.”
>>>Photos: Papal Cross Blessed at Malvern Retreat House by Archbishop Pérez
“To me, this cross tells the world we’re Catholic and we’re proud of it,” said Malvern Retreat House President Michael Norton. “It stands tall and we’re going to ‘be not afraid.’ That was the pope’s message. Don’t be afraid of our Catholic faith. It has to be in every part of your life, and that’s what that cross stands for.”
Pat Ciarrocchi, longtime KYW-TV news anchor and former Malvern Retreat House board member, echoed a popular Catholic hymn during her remarks.
“Lift high the cross. The love of Christ proclaimed,” she said.
“This iconic towering symbol of (Pope) John Paul II’s visit to Philadelphia, after standing on duty to the heavens for 45 years, came here to undergo its life-renewing renovation to bring us to this day, the day that the papal cross officially goes back on duty, lifting its arms to the heavens and carrying our prayerful petitions into the arms of our Heavenly Father.”
“It towered over John Paul II as he celebrated Mass,” she added. “His dynamism was so real that it lingered like a spiritual hologram.”
The cross stood over countless more people during its decades at St. Charles Seminary and its busy intersection in the city’s Overbrook section, after Cardinal John Krol proposed the cross’s move to the seminary.
“Millions would be stopped there along their journeys to home, to work, to the hospital, to be (at) the bedside of a loved one,” Ciarrocchi said. “Even in a sideways glance, you couldn’t miss the cross’s towering presence.
“I would drive by and I’d make the sign of the cross. I would speak a little prayer for my special intention of the moment, feeling confident that it would be lifted in petition or gratitude.”
Father Douglas McKay, the former director of Malvern Retreat House who carried a processional cross during St. John Paul II’s 1979 Mass in Philadelphia, took a call from a seminary official asking if the retreat center could take the cross while the seminary moved to its new campus in Ambler.
Norton, Malvern Retreat’s president, recalled how “I called Jim Molinari who was our chair, and before I could even get the question out, he said, ‘Michael, it’s a no-brainer. Get the cross,’” he said.
Contractors with the Petrongolo family began the moving process by lifting the cross from its pedestal on May 23, 2024.
“On that exact day, we woke up to the news that (Blessed) Carlo Acutis’ final miracle had been approved and that he would be canonized a saint. We just knew right away that there was a huge tie to Carlo,” said Mary Bea Damico, a Malvern Retreat House board member.
Ciarrocchi was present as the cross was taken down at the Overbrook campus.
“The men invited me to see it and then ultimately to touch it,” she said. “I felt when I touched it as if I was touching a relic. I thought I could almost hear it speak,“ said Ciarrocchi.
“What I heard was, ‘I never rested here because people came here to ask for me to help lift their prayer. So I’ll get all spruced up. Before long, I am going to be back at work. I’m going to be here and present so that tens of thousands, maybe a million people can ultimately come here and pray at the foot of this cross.”
Exactly 13 months later, on Corpus Christi Sunday, retreatants and visitors began praying there, a tradition that will continue among generations of Catholics in the Philadelphia region.
“To have all this happen on Corpus Christi, and to have (the Eucharist) as the center of what Blessed Carlo Acutis was all about, and to have all these people drawn together around the Eucharist and the cross today was really, really special,” said Damico.
“God put this together in a way that was more beautiful than anything I could have imagined.”
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