My wife turned to me the other day and said, “I really don’t feel like it’s Lent right now.” I replied that I felt the same way. As parents, every day of our lives feels a bit “Lentish.” We continuously sacrifice our time, money, sleep, and freedom to raise our boys the best we can. For 365 days a year parents have to sacrifice those little luxuries that others just put off for 40 days.
But before I give myself a Purple Heart for the sacrifices I’ve made in the parenting line of duty, I have to recall the Fourth Sorrowful Mystery of the rosary — Jesus Carrying the Cross. I don’t think anyone would disagree that Jesus endured and sacrificed a lot during His ministry and particularly during His Passion. No one would have been too critical of Jesus if He never got up from one of His falls under the weight of the cross. After all, He was in a human body that could only take so much punishment. And yet, He dug down deep, got up, and kept moving knowing that His earthly life was only going to get worse. Why? Because His love of God and doing His Father’s will outweighed all the pain and suffering.
Icon of Jesus being led to Golgotha, 16th century, Theophanes the Cretan (Stavronikita Monastery, Mount Athos). (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
We should follow Jesus’ example in His Passion and dig down deep and find that extra spiritual energy during Lent. It’s not like we have a sacrificial quota and those who make sacrifices all year are exempt or can take it easy during Lent. It’s actually just the opposite. God calls the spiritually fit and conditioned to push themselves even further. Jesus was the most spiritually fit person to walk the earth and He pushed Himself through the Passion and ultimately Crucifixion. God asked that of His son so surely we can do whatever small things God asks of us this Lent.
Even if you pray, fast, and live a Catholic life all year around, Lent is the time to go that extra mile. Like Jesus getting up after a fall and carrying His cross, we can all do a little more to better connect with a God who loves us and we should love in return. It doesn’t matter whether practicing your faith begins and ends one hour every Sunday or if you are Pope Francis, there is always a little something more you can do during Lent that you don’t do other times of the year.
To help, I found this article on Catholic Exchange about making the most of Lent. It’s still early in the Lenten season so if you’re off to a slow start (I’ve accidentally forgot that I gave up snacking twice already), give this a read and hopefully it will jumpstart your Lent.
I came across this article over at the National Catholic Register about how “real men pray.” It’s a commentary on Cardinal Burke’s comments that men have lost their sense of purpose within the Catholic Church. He points to the confusing and often conflicting messages presented by popular culture and the Church and how the Church is often silent addressing what it means to be a moral man.
I keyed in on this part of Cardinal Burke’s comments (I encourage you to read the full article at the National Catholic Register):
The crisis between man and woman has been made much worse by a complete collapse of catechesis in the Church. Young men grew up without proper instruction with regard to their faith and to the knowledge of their vocation. Young men were not being taught that they are made in the image of God – Father, Son and Holy Spirit. These young men were not taught to know all those virtues that are necessary in order to be a man and to fulfill the particular gifts of being male.
Prayer isn’t just for little, old ladies
I found Cardinal Burke’s comments timely because I made my new year’s resolution to read the Catechism of the Catholic Church (which is going well; I’m on verse 167 of 2865). I want to be better catechized particularly in this world of “soft Catholicism.” I liken myself to a patient wanting the doctor to give me the hard truth about my condition and the prescription for leading a spiritually healthy life. And I’m not looking for what is easy, but what is best for my mind, body, and soul.
Going back to Cardinal Burke’s comment, why do we have such a collapse of catechesis in the Church? I find it interesting that when we learn math, we learn about rules and formulas. When we learn science, we learn about rules and formulas. Economics — rules and formulas. Engineering — yep, rules and formulas. Languages, again with the rules and formulas. But for some reason, many people shy away from educating about the rules and dogmas of the Catholic faith out of a fear that it might upset someone or it may not be politically correct.
This fear of Church dogma wasn’t always the case. My mom told me that growing up the Baltimore Catechism was basically her text book for religious education. But over the years we’ve infantilized religious education to simple platitudes like “God loves you” and “Jesus wants us to be nice to each other.” Yes, it’s good to learn about a loving and merciful God. But that’s the starting point. We can’t stop there. If we want deepen our faith and our relationship with God we need to deepen our understanding of what our faith is. Furthermore, we can’t ignore or disregard the truth we learn because we don’t like it or it’s hard to follow. That’s like saying you don’t believe in gravity or 1+1=3.
One of the goals of RosaryMeds is to motivate you to really take the next steps, whatever that may be, to increase your understanding and love of your faith in Jesus’ church. When you pray the rosary, ask God to show you what those next steps are. Maybe it’s to pray more earnestly. Maybe its to read the Bible or the Catechism. Maybe it’s to read more RosaryMeds articles (hint, hint). Whatever form it may take, try hard to move your understanding of the Catholic Faith forward. We have an infinitely complex God so trust me, there is always something new to learn.
Welcome to 2015! I’m really excited about my new year’s resolution. I know, I know. I previously wrote about how new year’s resolutions are bad because labelling them as a resolution almost guarantees that you won’t actually follow through. But this year, with the help of a little technology, I think I will be able to meet my goal — reading the Catechism of the Catholic Church.
But why? Isn’t it a bit dry and the spiritual equivalent of reading up on tax law? Or, isn’t the Catechism more like a reference book that you search through when you have a specific question and not something you read end to end? To answer that, we’ll need to learn a little literary history.
Let’s go to 19th century France. The man is Victor Hugo and the book is Les Misérables. This is a looooong book clocking in at nearly 1,500 pages for a standard sized paperback version. The reason why it’s so long is because Hugo went to great lengths to provide a historical context for the events in the book. He dedicates chapters describing the battle of Waterloo, the Parisian sewer system, life in a nunnery, Parisian street slang, 19th century manufacturing processes, etc. These aren’t little Wikipedia like descriptions either but are the size and scope of small books onto themselves. These tangents paint a richer world for the events of the book to take place in. The characters in Les Misérables don’t exist in a vacuum, but live in a bigger world that we can relate to or at least understand because Hugo provides seemingly endless background information.
Fast forward to the 20th century and look at J.R.R. Tolkien. You know his seminal works — The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit. What you may not know is that there is a lot of auxiliary writings which describe Middle Earth, the land where the events of those books take place. Tolkien wrote extensively about the culture of hobbits, dwarfs, elves, etc. He wrote a book called The Silmarillion which describes the universe of Eä which contains Middle Earth as well as other lands. Like Victor Hugo, Tolkien wrote the background of the places and characters in his books to provide a much richer reading experience because the events happen within a known context. The Lord of the Rings isn’t a small book or movie because Middle Earth is not a small place. Elves, dwarves, hobbits, humans, and orcs all act the way they do in the books and movies because Tolkien gave them a detailed history. Without that history and culture being spelled out, I bet The Lord of the Rings would not have been the complex, layered, and rich book/movie it turned out to be.
By now it should become increasingly obvious why I want to read the CCC. I want to become more knowledgeable about the Catholic faith so that I can have a richer experience living that faith. When I pray the rosary or listen to a homily I want to have what I learned reading the CCC in the back of my mind to make new mental and spiritual connections. I hope that reading the CCC will generate a whole new level of intentions and meditations when I pray the rosary. I hope that the increased understanding of the Catholic faith will seep into my writings in my future books (fingers crossed) and on RosaryMeds.
Think of it like this. Your average Catholic who hasn’t read the CCC is like someone who has only seen the Les Misérables musical or The Lord of the Rings movies. They have a good understanding of the material and appreciate it but they don’t know the whole picture as envisioned by Hugo and Tolkien respectively. But the person who has read more church documents like the CCC is like the person who has read Les Misérables or The Silmarillion and understands the greater context and all the little details that are left out of the more popular works.
New year’s resolutions fail because many people only define a goal, not a process for achieving that goal. I’m a software engineer and I’m all about defining processes for achieving goals. So here’s how I will achieve my goal of reading the Catechism. Last year I finally bit the bullet and bought my first smartphone. It has opened up a whole new world of productivity, especially during my commute. I spend roughly six hours a week on the road. Thanks to an app called @Voice Aloud Reader I can turn any text into an audio book. Combined with my Catholic prayer app, Laudate, I can listen to the entire Catechism on my commutes. I know I won’t have Doctor of the Church level retention of the information, but I will pick up the major themes and a general understanding.
Here’s wishing you all the best of luck in this new year!
As many of you know, I’m a software engineer. My career revolves around analyzing the business needs of my employer and designing and implementing a software solution. Although my job title has the word engineer in it and my degree is in a science, the software development world can be an undisciplined, unscientific mess. Someone who doesn’t understand software development might be a little uneasy with the number of bugs that are introduced in the process, the amount of code that gets thrown out or rewritten, and how different a final product will look from the initial concept or prototype. Personally, every good idea I have usually stems from five bad ones — some being immediately dismissed while others I worked on a bit before realizing they weren’t a good fit for what I was trying to accomplish.
I see a lot of parallels between my experience in writing software and the recent Synod on the Family. A lot of commentary and fuss has been made over the midterm report. It shows a process where it may appear bishops are make statements and decisions contrary to Church doctrine in topics like divorce and homosexuality. We have to remember that this report isn’t the finished product nor a definitive statement upholding or changing Church doctrine.
The synod is like a piece of code in progress. Sometimes I just have to write a few lines of code to steer my thinking in the right direction. Similarly, I think the bishops have to bring up topics and lines of thought, not with the intent of those thoughts becoming the final word. Rather, it steers the dialog in different directions to find the right path — the truth of Jesus Christ.
While I’m a little uneasy about the statements being reported, I’m also glad that they are at least being mentioned. It wouldn’t be much of a synod if the bishops sat down and just regurgitated Church teaching, patted each other on the back for their rote knowledge, and went home. Again, in the software world I would be highly skeptical of a code’s quality that was completed quickly with no revisions. How do we know that the developer took into account all the scenarios and details? Why didn’t he integrate any feedback from his colleagues? Similarly, the mentioning of ideas that run counter to the Church’s teachings shouldn’t be seen as a challenge to the doctrine but as part of the exploration of these broad and complex topics. I want my bishops to leave no stone unturned in their search for truth.
One of the great mysteries enshrined in the ecclesiology of the Catholic Church is that Christ speaks through the rather messy and unpredictable process of ecclesiastical argument. The Holy Spirit guides the process of course, but he doesn’t undermine or circumvent it. It is precisely in the long, laborious sifting of ideas across time and through disciplined conversation that the truth that God wants to communicate gradually emerges.
The interim report on the Synod represents a very early stage of the sausage-making process and, unsurprisingly, it isn’t pretty. Two more weeks of discussion will follow; then a full year during which the findings of the Synod will be further refined, argued about, and clarified; then the Ordinary Synod on the Family will take place (the one going on now is the Extraordinary Synod), and many more arguments and counter-arguments will be made; finally, some months, perhaps even a year or so, after that, the Pope will write a post-Synodal exhortation summing up the entire process and offering a definitive take on the matter. At that point, I would suggest, something resembling edible sausage will be available for our consumption; until then, we should all be patient and refrain from bloviating.
Now, I would also be naive to think that there aren’t some bishops guided more by politics than the Holy Spirit in this process. I think that’s part of the reason why this interim report was released to the public — so that some bishops could score some political points with the Church’s critics. It’s their way of getting some political cover by implying, “You see! I did try to represent your viewpoints but the magisterium didn’t listen.” Unfortunately, I think some bishops are aiming more to increase the Church’s likability by bending her teachings to the whims of society and not through explaining her truths.
I don’t think there will be a radical rewriting of Church doctrine when this is all over and many of the bishops know that. So those who may have ulterior motives other than fostering dialog may want their viewpoints made public so that they can become a talking point or be used in a counter argument in future debates. Unfortunately, our society (the media in particular) has an uncanny way of turning “this was mentioned in the synod” into “this is what the Catholic Church believes.” And over time, the context certain statements were made in will be completely lost and all you’re left with is a soundbite from Nancy Pelosi quoting the interim synod report and misrepresenting Church doctrine.
The media’s “goto” person for Catholic teaching.
Like St. Simeon in the Fourth Joyful Mystery of the rosary, we must show patience for this process. St. Simeon had faith that he would one day see God’s Chosen One. We too must have faith that the truth of Jesus Christ will not only reveal itself, but will burn more brightly when held up against weaker ideas. We pray for patience with the Church, both personally and for a patience from the greater society to not misrepresent the Church’s teachings. We also need to pray for the bishops and all those taking part in the synod that they let the Holy Spirit guide their thoughts and actions. And we must pray especially for those bishops who may treat their vocation as a political office rather than spiritual shepherds.
In a previous post I wrote about how a group of satanists were going to hold a “black mass” in Oklahoma City. The day came and went and the black mass drew a crowd of 1,600 people! Oh wait, that was the number of potesters and people coming to pray and bear witness to the Christian faith. Only 42 people (0f the 88 tickets sold) actually attended the black mass. To put that in perspective, 42 people probably fills the first two or three rows of a large church. Not too many at all.
About 1,600 Roman Catholics gathered Sunday afternoon to bear witness to their Christian faith in the face of “dark forces targeting Oklahoma City, the site of a satanic “black mass” to be held Sunday night.
About 1,200 people crowded into the sanctuary, gym and a cafeteria area at St. Francis of Assisi Catholic Church for a holy hour prayer service called by Archbishop Paul S. Coakley.
Another estimated 400 people gathered outside the church at 1901 NW 18 to listen to the service blaring through speakers set up outdoors. In his homily, Coakley thanked the faithful for joining together on the eve of the satanic event.
“Your presence here today is a powerful witness of your faith in the midst of a challenging time for our community,” Coakley said.
Coakley, spiritual leader for the Archdiocese of Oklahoma City, then shared the reason for the afternoon gathering — a war being waged against the devil.
“Our city has been targeted by dark forces,” he told the crowd.
Coakley said as Christians “we know that Christ conquered Satan. The war has been won, Christ has conquered though skirmishes will continue until Christ comes to reign forever.”
I would like to think that many of the people who bought a ticket to the black mass but didn’t attend had their hearts swayed by the Holy Spirit invoked by those praying for these misguided souls. Perhaps some of the no-shows realized that they were playing with fire if they attended, even if they were only curious. Attending a black mass because you’re curious is like shooting yourself in the chest because you’re curious what a gunshot wound feels like. There are just some things you don’t need to personally experience to know that they aren’t good for you. I really feel like the Holy Spirit was able to reach a few souls and awakened them to the harm participating in a black mass would do to them.
I think this event is an interesting example of why God allows bad things to happen in our world. One of the popular answers to this vexing question is that God knows that it will bring about the greater good. Look at this case. 1,600 people assembled and prayed together on a Sunday afternoon because of this great evil taking place. These people (along with who knows how many more in spirit) took time out of their day to witness their faith when they otherwise might have been going about their lives running errands or watching football. That’s 38x as many people strengthening their faith as those putting their soul at risk. A definite win for the greater good!
“That’s it, we’re firing our agent!”
Now while 42 people attending the black mass is small, it’s still 42 souls at risk. Jesus and Mary are saddened by every soul that deliberately turns away from God. We need to pray for those souls that they open their hearts to the Holy Spirit and our Mother Mary to the healing embrace of God’s grace. I remember the Fifth Sorrowful Mystery of the rosary, Jesus’ Crucifixion, where he prayed to God to forgive the people who crucified him saying, “they know not what they do.” I think knowing not what they do pretty accurately describes all those who attended the black mass. These are the people in most need of our prayers. When you take out your rosary today, pray not only these 42 wayward souls but for everyone who doesn’t really know the seriousness and eternal consequences of their actions.
Unfortunately, the media has been reporting so much bad news lately that many Catholics may have missed this one among the headlines about Ferguson or ISIS. A group of satanists were going to hold a black mass using a stolen Eucharist in Oklahoma City. The bishop successfully sued them for theft and the satanists returned the blessed host. They will still hold their black mass as is their Constitutional right but without the Eucharist. For those who don’t know, a black mass is one that follows the same routine as a Catholic Mass, but in honor of Satan. In other words, they make a mockery of Catholic Church to please the devil.
Believe it or not, this was the only depiction of a black mass that didn’t involve nudity.
When I heard about the black mass using a stolen host I wasn’t too shocked or appalled. After all, the holy Eucharist often falls into the hands of people undeserving to receive it. At Mass every Sunday, I see nearly everyone in the church receiving communion. But how many of them are really deserving to receive it by having no mortal sins on their souls and having fasted appropriately beforehand? I’m not making judgements on anyone, but the numbers just don’t add up. I once heard a priest remark, “Isn’t it interesting how short the lines to confession are on Saturday and how long the lines for communion are on Sunday? Either we live among a huge number of saints or some people are receiving the Eucharist who should not.” So in that light, if so many people within the Catholic Church aren’t showing the Eucharist the respect it deserves, why should I be upset about a group of satanists getting their hands on it?
But then what did appal me was the fact that I wasn’t too appalled by the satanists’ theft and intention to use it in their black mass. My lack of shock and sadness reminded me of just how weak my faith is at times. After all, the Eucharist is the true presence of our Lord, Jesus Christ. A consecrated host is no different than Jesus being present in bodily form. It is one of the cornerstones of the Catholic faith and is one of the main differences between Catholics and protestants. And yet my apathy towards this instance in Oklahoma City does reveal the gaps in my faith.
The good news is that we can work towards bridging that faith gap. I start where I always start — the rosary. Particularly, in this case, I focus on the Fifth Luminous Mystery, The Instantiation of the Eucharist. I meditate on how faith isn’t something that just happens instantaneously, but something that requires work and an open heart. Think about the apostles at the Last Supper. They witnessed the first Eucharist from Jesus himself and yet their faith was shaken in the proceeding days of Jesus’ crucifixion. They betrayed him, abandoned him, and denied that they knew him. Bridging that faith gap was something they all needed to work on just like we do today. And all of the apostles, with the exception of Judas, earned their way into sainthood. That should give all of us hope that no matter how weak or shaken our faith may be, all of us have an opportunity to improve it through prayer, the sacraments, fasting, good works, and God’s grace.
3rd quarter of 16th century (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
Another rosary mystery that comes to mind when I think about the black mass and the stolen Eucharist is the Fifth Sorrowful Mystery, Jesus’ Crucifixion. The Romans put Jesus to death in the most horrific way possible and yet that couldn’t break Jesus’ resolve. Nor could they suppress his message that was spread throughout the world by his followers fueled by the Holy Spirit. Like the Eucharist, the cross became a cornerstone of the Christian faith and there is nothing the world can do that will stop God’s truth from being heard. There is nothing that will break the spirit of God’s Church. And so I see these satanists in a similar light as the Romans. There is nothing they can do in a black mass, even if they had the stolen Eucharist, that will have any effect on God and His Church. The world has tried numerous times to crush Christianity going all the way back to Jesus’ crucifixion. Satanists and their black masses just continue that fruitless tradition. Should we feel saddened by their actions and pray for their conversion? You bet. Should we feel scared that their actions weaken God or His Church? Not in the least.
Devotion to my Rosary is a great sign of predestination.
My 2 year old son is at an age where he wants to act like a grownup. One example is that he often refuses to drink out of a sealed “sippy” cup and wants just a plain glass. Not only that, he doesn’t want anyone to help him hold it. Whenever I try to offer a hand to make sure he doesn’t spill or drop the glass, he quickly waves me off. He also wants to walk around with the glass of water to his play area and refuses to let me carry it for him. I explain that I should carry it because he will most likely spill it. In fact, spilling the water is almost a certainty. But despite my warnings, my son chooses to carry the water glass himself and of course ends up spilling water as he bounces up and down walking.
I wanted to help my son carry and drink his water. I wanted him to not spill the water on the floor or on himself (who likes being soaking wet?). But despite all my reasoning, good intentions, and offer to help transport the glass of water safely to the other room, my son ignored my warnings and did it his own way. And I knew spilled water would be the result, but I let him make his own decision to try something his own way even when I knew it wouldn’t produce the desired result.
“Fine, carry the water yourself.”
This brings us to the idea of predestination. But what a minute! Isn’t predestination a protestant belief that Catholics don’t believe in? Well no. Catholics also have a concept of predestination although it differs from the protestant belief. To put it simply, some protestants (Calvinists particularly) believe that since God is all knowing and exists outside of time and space, He has already decided who will get into Heaven and who will end up in Hell. And because of this knowledge, our destiny has already been decided and there is nothing we can do to change it.
The Catholic’s interpretation of predestination is rooted in the idea that God has a plan for all of us that predestines us to Heaven. God calls every soul to live in His heavenly kingdom and He gives us the means to get there. But this is where Catholics and Calvinists split. For Catholics, God has not predestined anyone to Hell. Instead, the damned willing reject God’s predestined plan for salvation. In other words, God lays out the roadmap that leads to Heaven and some people freely choose not to follow it.
Sometimes its best to follow someone else’s plan
Going back to the scenario with my son and the water glass. I knew that by freely rejecting my advice my son was going to spill the water glass. But I did not will or cause the water to spill. I just knew that was going to be the result based on my knowledge of my son’s motor skills and the laws of physics. Similarly, when we reject God’s predestined plan for us, He knows the unfavorable result of that decision based on his divine knowledge of, well, everything.
What does the rosary have to do with predestination? Mary promises that those who pray the rosary will have insights into God’s divine roadmap that leads to Heaven. By praying the rosary, you get a better perspective on whether you are on the right track towards eternal salvation. This really ties in nicely with many of Mary’s other rosary promises about living a holy life filled with signal graces and the sacraments of the Church. It’s fitting that talking about predestination is her final promise because it essentially summarizes all the other rosary promises. If you pray the rosary you put yourself in a position to better understand and follow God’s predestined plan to spend eternity in Heaven.
rosary (Photo credit: Muffet)
Keep in mind that praying the rosary doesn’t guarantee salvation. It’s not like you can pray the rosary every day, sin to your heart’s content, and then expect to get into Heaven. But if you are truly devoted to the rosary then you understand it isn’t a magic talisman but more of a means of making you better attuned to God’s Will. And when you do have that understanding, the idea of doing anything counter to God’s Will and losing His grace will seem ludicrous. Of course, we all have our human weaknesses that cause us to forget, ignore, or doubt this great heavenly goal every once in a while. But God devised a great system, through the Catholic Church, the sacraments, the rosary, the saints, and the intercessions of our Mother Mary to get back on track. May we take advantage of the many paths included in God’s predestined plan for us to enjoy the His heavenly kingdom.
I have obtained from my Divine Son that all the advocates of the Rosary shall have for intercessors the entire Celestial Court during their life and at the hour of death.
Imagine that a little 9 year old child walked up and asked you to teach him some basic mathematics. You excitedly run to the bookshelf and pick up your linear algebra book from college. You figure that solving a few matrix equations should be a good introduction to math. You start running through some sample problems when the child’s eyes just glaze over because he has no idea what you’re talking about. You slow down and really step him through the process. You even start taking out pieces of paper to explain the intersection of planes. But no matter how slow you go and what you do, the 9 year old is just lost, confused, and frustrated.
Uh, run that by me one more time?
It’s not really your fault or the child’s fault that he could not pick up basic math concepts from linear algebra. It was just a mismatch in the child’s understanding of math and what is required to understand a complex topic like linear algebra. The little child did not have adequate prerequisite knowledge to comprehend linear algebra. He may be incredibly bright for his age but he still can’t instantly conjure up 10 years worth of math concepts no matter how hard either of you try.
Trying to understand God is much like a little child trying to comprehend linear algebra. No matter how hard we may try, God’s nature is just something beyond our comprehension. In fact, our gap in understanding God’s nature is infinitely greater than the child’s gap in understanding complex mathematical concepts. Mathematics may be a large field, but at least it’s something possibly within the realm of understanding given enough time and practice. God’s nature, on the other hand, is something that is infinite and beyond human comprehension regardless of how much time and effort you put into it.
Take someone who is quite well catechized like Pope Francis. His understanding of God may be 100x greater than the average Catholic. But if God’s nature was represented as grains of sand on the entire planet, the pope’s knowledge of God would still just be one or two grains of sand worth (and that’s being generous). There’s a reason why God is the Alpha and Omega. His nature is infinite and beyond what are finite minds can possibly comprehend.
But that is where the celestial court comes in to help us better understand God. A more common term to describe the celestial court is the communion of saints. You profess your belief in it every Sunday when you pray the Nicene creed when you say “I believe in the communion of saints.” The communion of saints are so important in the Catholic Church partly because they help us better understand what God wants of us. Each saint was a living manifestation of an aspect of God’s nature. When we look at the saints and what they did in their lives, we get a mosaic of who God is. Granted, it’s still a very rough picture of God, but it’s better than nothing. We may be like children when it comes to understanding God, but the saints’ examples give us the basic lessons for understanding how God wants us to live.
A detail from John Nava’s tapestry of the communion of saints. Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
For example, St. Francis demonstrated humility and charity by giving up a life of comfort and wealth for a life of poverty and service to the poor. St. Faustina shows us the virtues of mercy and compassion. St. Maria Goretti showed us forgiveness. St. Madeleine Sophie Barat showed us unconditional love. Soon-to-be-saint John Paul II shows us that we all have the inner strength to follow God despite our worldly situation. All of these are virtues God wants all of us to exhibit. But again, we have no way of fully comprehending God’s Will directly from Him. But we can understand aspects of God’s Will by looking at the saints.
Like Mary’s other promises, she promises us intercession. Mary offers us her personal intercession in previous promises and now she includes help from the communion of saints. We need all the prayers we can get and we should rejoice that we belong to a faith that promises so much help from people living in God’s grace. I know I take comfort that I don’t face life’s challenges alone but have the help of the saints in Heaven. I also have them as role models for how I can achieve eternal salvation no matter where I am in life. I remember this saying I once heard on the radio — every saint has a past and every sinner has a future. In other words, not all the saints lived very saintly at some point in their lives but they were able to “wise up” and commit themselves to living God’s Will. Hopefully we can follow in their footsteps and do the same.
All those who propagate the Holy Rosary shall be aided by me in their necessities.
Remember when I said in my previous post about Mary’s rosary promises seeming like a spiritual infomercial? Well, I take that back. This promise proves that the rosary is more like an affiliate marketing campaign. In affiliate marketing, someone gets a small bonus when they convince someone to sign up for a certain service or buy a specific product. Mary seems to offer us a sort of spiritual affiliate benefit when we spread the joy of rosary meditation to others. It’s great to pray the rosary for your own good. But spreading the rosary has an exponentially greater affect both for you own personal salvation and the Catholic Church as a whole.
Where is your rosary?
Imagine if you were able to convince two other people to start praying the rosary regularly. Now picture those two people each finding two more to pray the rosary and those people went out and got two more and so on. It doesn’t take to many levels of propagation before hundreds, maybe thousands, and heck, even millions of people turn to rosary prayer starting from your initial passion for it! Now can you image a Church fueled by rosary prayer and receiving the graces Mary promises us? That would be one joyful and sincerely happy world-wide community of believers with the strength to truly change all the ills of this world. And all because you took one leap of faith to pray the rosary routinely and another leap to share your passion with others.
Your personal rosary prayer will yield much more fruit when you propagate rosary prayer to a wider audience. But this isn’t because you earn more spiritual points that upgrade you to some higher Catholic membership. It’s not like Mary sits in Heaven with a clipboard with your personal rosary score. I don’t think she’s saying, “Well let’s see here. Brent has convinced 10 people to start praying the rosary, he tries to pray it every weekday, but it looks like he missed some days. So he’s a silver rosary rewards member which means he gets 3 intercessions a year.” Not quite.
Like Mary’s other promises, the benefits of this one is more of a logical consequence of praying the rosary devoutly. When you truly enjoy something or find something valuable, are you more likely to share it with others or keep it hidden? As Facebook clearly shows, when you are passionate about something you have a tendency to share it with others. People share their opinions and promote television shows, sports, music, movies, and books all the time (just look at the large number of reviews for any given product on Amazon). Why would prayer be any different? It is logical that those who are passionate about rosary prayer will also want to share it with others. If you truly believe in the benefits of rosary prayer and it’s something that gives you great comfort facing life’s challenges, why wouldn’t you want to share it with your friends and family?
If you are sharing the joy of rosary prayer and meditation then chances are you are already praying it regularly and devoutly. After all, why would you promote something that doesn’t interest you or doesn’t provide you any value? As I said in previous articles, those who do pray the rosary devoutly will be better tuned into how Mary is trying to aid them. She is always trying to reach out to us but it is those who are really trying to listen to her through the rosary who will receive more aid in their necessities. But it’s not from Mary giving more aid to some than others. Rather, it’s some people making more of an effort to receive Mary’s aid by making time to listen to her through rosary meditation and being receptive to how she wants to help you.
Now here’s the hard part. It’s easy for me to write this article and have a few dozen (hopefully hundreds of) people read this. It is easy for you all to forward an email or share this post (please do that). We can all sit back and think we did our part in propagating the rosary. And yes, we did. But I think that’s putting the quantity of rosary propagation over the quality. Maybe we should instead make an effort to personally invite a friend or family member to pray the rosary with us. It may not be the easiest way to propagate rosary prayer, but I think there is value in actually getting a single soul praying the rosary rather than telling hundreds of people who can easily ignore you. Are you ready to take that challenge?
I shall deliver from purgatory those who have been devoted to the Rosary.
Ah Purgatory! After the high regard Catholics have for Mary, nothing seems more contentious than the existence and need for Purgatory. It brings up debates between Catholics and protestants and questions like, “Where is Purgatory mentioned in the bible?” Aside from the theological arguments whether Purgatory exists, there is just a general fear of it. I think many people don’t really care all that much about the theological underpinnings of Purgatory. Rather, many wish that it didn’t exist because they think it’s some sort of “Hell Lite.”
We need to frame Purgatory in the proper context — it is a level of existence between our earthly life and a heavenly one where we become purified and worthy of Heaven. We cast off the last layers of our earthly selves — the sin, the shortcomings, the weakness to temptation, the pressure and anxieties, and everything else that prevents us from fully embracing God‘s love. No matter how good any of us are, with the exception of the saints, most of us die tied down to worldly things in some way or another. Purgatory is like that final, cleansing bath that washes away that worldly “grime” we accumulated throughout our lives.
Splashy, splashy! Time to get clean for God’s kingdom.
If we truly understood the majesty and beauty of what awaits us in Heaven, we would not only understand why we need Purgatory, but actually want to go to it. I think that when we die and we get the full sense of who God is, we would not even consider entering His kingdom any other way but in a state of perfection. Would you want to attend a wedding in your work clothes? Would you walk through someone’s immaculately clean home in muddy shoes? There are social situations in this life where we feel embarrassed if we arrive in a state not appropriate for the event. Similarly, I think when we get a taste of just how awesome God is at our final judgement, we won’t give a stay in Purgatory a second thought. The notion of entering His kingdom with any worldly blemishes will seem embarrassingly laughable.
But just because we understand the need for Purgatory doesn’t make it any easier to endure. But the suffering isn’t the type of suffering we encounter in Hell. Rather, we suffer because we know just how close we are to the infinite joy and peace of Heaven. We are like children on Christmas Eve that can’t wait for Christmas morning and open the presents under the tree. Every minute is just agony as time just seems to slow to a stop and it seems like Christmas day will never come. Likewise, every moment in Purgatory probably seems unbearable with the knowledge that we are so close to completing a long journey. We want Mary to act as our advocate so our time waiting in Purgatory will be brief.
Like many of her other promises, I think Mary reveals more of a result of praying the rosary than something that she actively applies. Those who are devoted to the rosary are less likely to commit sins which require a longer stay in Purgatory to clean. Those who pray the rosary already have a better understanding of just how great Heaven must be and try extra hard to live in a way where they will most quickly arrive in Heaven after their death. As I said in early articles, it’s not solely the act of praying the rosary itself that leads us to Heaven, but the wisdom and will to live in God’s grace that it helps implant in our souls. Mary is here to help those who want her help and ask for it through rosary prayer.
Ask for Mary’s help to quickly pass through Purgatory. Pick up a rosary and pray it today!
