All Saints Day this year is also the 75th anniversary of the priestly ordination of St. Pope John Paul II (May 18, 1920 – April 2, 2005).
On the eve of this momentous day, I picked up my copy of 100 Ways John Paul II Changed the World by Patrick Novecosky. St. Pope John Paul's 27 years as pope began while I was in college in 1978, so I witnessed that he did indeed change the world. I have a portrait of him in my bedroom and often ask his intercession.
In 1933, as the stage was being set for World War II, our Blessed Mother appeared in Banneux, Belgium. She came as a messenger of peace and mother of the poor; inviting each person to care for his brothers and sisters, the lowliest, and the suffering. I knew nothing of these apparitions until this past June when I witnessed the effects—a divine chain reaction— sparked by the apparitions that inspired a priest who changed the lives of untold thousands.
The rosary is a spiritual weapon of mass destruction, leaving sin in its wake and laying the ground for miracles, conversions, and victories over evil, attained by Jesus through the intercession of his mother. It is the prayers of the life of Christ through Mary—just as he chose to come to us through his Incarnation.
The first time it happened was an August night in 2000. I was walking up to the press box in St. Louis’s Busch Stadium, where the hometown Cardinals were playing the Cincinnati Reds, the baseball team I’ve covered for the Dayton Daily News for the last 31 years. Suddenly, everything went blurry in my right eye.
Archbishop Fulton J. Sheen mesmerized audiences. He was not afraid to speak the truth. More importantly, people were not afraid to hear it.
His inspirational American television series, Life is Worth Living ran on the Dumont Television Network from February 12, 1952, to April 26, 1955, then on ABC until April 8, 1957. Archbishop Sheen’s talks are timeless and prophetic such as one of his talks transcribed below that addresses the world we live in today.
I’ve never felt God has communicated directly with me. I have heard that sentiment from several people. But isn’t that just the way it’s supposed to be? I once thought.
This story happened 21 years ago between Pbro José Rodrigo López Cepeda and a young altar server named Gabriel. The priest stated on his Facebook page: “It has been published on many platforms is no longer mine. It is of all who make it theirs because the great protagonist is ‘Jesus ‘ in Gabriel and that kiss that many would like to perceive.” Here is what happened in his own words.
How did a priest with a Bible study beat out every other podcast in the country, even ahead of everything the secular world has to offer? That’s not just hopeful; it’s amazing!
Today is the 850th anniversary of the martyrdom of Saint Thomas Becket on December 29, 1170. Thomas Becket was a statesman, a scholar, a chancellor, a priest, an archbishop, and a lion of religious liberty. Before the Magna Carta was drafted, before the right to free exercise of religion was enshrined as America’s first freedom in our glorious Constitution, Thomas gave his life so that, as he said, “the Church will attain liberty and peace.”
