For the Feast of the Body and Blood of Christ (formerly known as Corpus Christi), sv. Tomáš again had one of these joint Czech / Spanish / English liturgies. The reason for the joint liturgy was to ensure that we would have enough time for a procession after Mass:
We processed from sv. Tomáš to sv. Josef, which we entered and had a brief prayer and hymn in Spanish. From sv. Josef we went on to the Order of Malta church of Panna Marie Pod Retězem (Our Lady Beneath the Chain), where we switched to English for our prayer and hymn.
Aside: I’ve never heard of a devotion to "Our Lady Beneath the Chain". On Googling, the closest I could find was a devotion to Our Lady of the Chain, which originated at the end of the 14th century in Sicily, but apparently made it Malta early on. So I think this is just a confusion of prepositions.
The story in brief is of three young men condemned to die on the gallows. While awaiting their execution, in the church of St. Mary of the Port, they were chained, kept under guard, and the doors of the church were securely locked. That night, the guards that were on duty fell asleep and the three condemned men found themselves at the foot of an image of the Blessed Virgin Mary. They prayed fervently for deliverance. While they were praying, the chains mysteriously fell to the ground. The doors of the church opened by themselves, and they heard these words coming from the image of the Blessed Virgin: "Go, you are free, do not fear. The Divine Infant Whom I hold in my arms has heard your prayers and has granted your freedom." The prisoners silently walked out of the Church.
When the guards awakened, they went after and, finally, caught up with their prisoners. The men would have been chained again and taken away for execution, had it not been for the people who interceded for them with the King. The King, having heard what had happened, granted them their freedom, saying: "The Blessed Virgin Mary has set them free, so will I."
The final stop on our procession was the Infant of Prague church of Panny Marie Vítězné (Our Lady Victorious), where we finished up in Czech.
As on previous occasions when we’ve had processions, we gave the tourists a thrill.
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