To you we turn, Mother of the Church, to you who with your "fiat" opened the door to the presence of Christ in the world, in the history of souls, welcoming with humble silence and total availability the call of the Most High. Grant that many men and women may also hear the urgent voice of your Son: "Follow me". Grant that they may have the courage to leave their families, their occupations, their earthly hopes and follow Christ along the path that He will show them. Extend your maternal intercession over priests; over religious men and women who assist the elderly, the sick, the handicapped and orphans; over those who work in the field of teaching; over the members of secular institutes, who are the silent leaven of good works; over those who, in the cloister, live by faith and love, and pray for the salvation of the world.

Amen.

(St. John Paul II)

Born in Carracastle, Ballina, County Mayo, Ireland, on January 10, 1909. He immigrated to the United States in 1927. He entered the Congregation of the Holy Cross in 1932 and was ordained a priest in 1941. He is the founder and director of the Family Rosary Crusade, and traveled the world speaking about Our Lady.

He recounts: "Why does a child receive from God the immense grace of being another Christ? It is a mystery. Why did God grant me this grace? Only He knows. This would be the true answer, but not the one you are asking for. To answer you, then, I will try to speak of the people, places, circumstances and influences that crossed my path and guided my steps to the altar of God. It is often said that it is in the home that saints and sinners are made. Fortunate is the person whose parents love and fear God, and receive the child as a great divine gift. I was fortunate to be born to such parents. For them God was true. For them, a child was a great gift and a great responsibility. The Lord entrusted nine little ones to their care, for whom they created a home that imitated that of Nazareth. In those years when impressions are engraved on the soul as the imprint of a coin is engraved on wax when pressed, every night I saw my father and mother kneeling with my siblings, talking to God, showing him their love and telling him how they believed in his truth. Thus, as a reason for my becoming a priest, there is above all the Blessed Virgin, especially through the family rosary. Our family lived in one of the poor regions in the west of Ireland, between the mountains and the sea. My father had poor health. We had only a few acres of land and there were nine children to feed and clothe. From the age of fourteen to eighteen, I went to work with a farmer in the countryside. For the first time I had to leave home to live with strangers, returning to my parents only on weekends. It was October and my work consisted of harvesting potatoes. At the end of the first day, we had dinner together, and at bedtime I waited for the father or mother in that house to say what I had always heard in mine, “It's time for the rosary.” But I didn't hear it; there was no family rosary there. For the first time I understood the difference between living in a “house” and not in a “home”… That night I knelt alone in the darkness of my room to pray the rosary.

I spent the rest of the week restless: I tried to figure out how to tell that family what they were missing. At last Saturday came, and that night the farmer accompanied me part of the way home because, being so small, I was afraid to return home in the dark. When the time came for us to part, I bravely set out to preach my first sermon on the rosary as a family to that giant. That night, on a deserted road, Our Lady saw a boy of about fifteen talking about Her to a man who worked like a slave from morning till night to feed and clothe his family, but forgetting about the spiritual....

That night Our Lady must have smiled seeing that little son of hers defending her cause. And surely it was then that she gave me an abundant reward: that of the work that the Providence of God and the love of the Virgin have given me with my priestly ordination…”

To be continued...

Agustin Fuentes, a Mexican priest appointed vice-postulator for the causes of beatification of Francisco and Jacinta, had a conversation with Sr. Lucia on December 26, 1957.

Among other things, she told him: “Father, tell everyone that the devil is waging a decisive battle against Our Lady and that what most afflicts the Immaculate Heart of Mary and the Sacred Heart of Jesus is the fall of the souls of Religious and Priests. The devil knows that consecrated souls, by abandoning their privileged vocation, drag many souls to hell... The devil wants to take possession of consecrated souls.

He tries to corrupt them so that in this way he can induce others to final impenitence.

The devil now uses all his cunning to suggest that the life of religious be brought into line with the demands of the times”.