On Friday I started my Chilean Schoenstatt Shrine visits. First, we went (me, my mom, and my host sister Maca) to Bellavista (and it is quite a bella, beautiful vista, view I assure you!). Because the founder was here and presented a special document here on the 31st of May, 1949, it is a pretty special shrine in general. I also saw the girls youth house and met a sister from the US who lives here, so that was pretty great too.
tomb of Mario Hiriart^
Afterwards I finally went to the shrine at the end of our block. It is beautiful, called "Cenaculo de la Providencia", or Cenacle of Providence. Providencia is the neighborhood of Santiago where I am living, and for me it is comforting to know that I am here in "las manos de los de Providencia...tambien en las manos de Providencia". In the hands of those from Providenicia as well as in God's hands.
On Saturday we went to two cities about an hour and a half away. They are Valparaíso and Viña del Mar. I will post more about that adventure later, but for now about the shrines.
those are pictures from Agua Santa, the shrine in Valparaiso. The cities are right next to each other so it's practically the same thing anyway, but it's right in Valparaiso. You can see it in the second photo :) There you can also see a picture of my three "mamás". My American mom, my Chilean mom, and my Heavenly mom. Not that I don't have others, but the three most important at this moment. In the last picture you can see something about the mission of this shrine. Outside of it there is the grave of a priest who was in the founding generation of Schoenstatt youth in Germany, but I don't remember his name unfortunately. 
Visiting the shrine that is pictured above was quite the unforgettable adventure. Santuario Los Pinos (the pines) is located in Viña del Mar, near Agua Santa (holy water) but since we got lost and drove around for an hour and a half trying to find it, I really don't know how close it is haha. Once we finally found it, the others were looking outside around the place and I went into the shrine alone. It was super dark and I pressed some buttons trying to turn on the lights but nothing worked. I knelt down to pray, and then I noticed the stained glass window of Fr. Kentenich in at Grant Park in Milwaukee!! I got very excited and went to take a picture of it. Suddenly I heard sirens outside so I went to see what was going on. Then it became apparent that the siren was some sort of alarm coming from the shrine. Some man came and was asking us what happened and I said I just tried to turn on the lights with these buttons and then a few minutes later the alarm went off! It was obviously really embarrassing, but I was glad no other strangers were there and it is not in the city directly. The man said that the lights don't work because with the bad weather they have been having, the power was out. Only after when the others came into the shrine did I realize they alarm went off because in the dark I couldn't see the sign that said don't step past the communion rail because of the alarm. The moral of the story and fun fact is that the shrines in Chile (at least all those that I visited, although I only realized it afterwards) have alarm systems that go off if you step unauthorized into the sanctuary. It was a little one moment in my silliness, but all in all was a good few days of shrine visits. I'm sure more to come of other adventures, but thanks for the prayers and hope all is well with all of you!
Love, Abby
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