Category Archives: Reflections

05/10/13

Real Men Pray The Rosary

rmptr_facebook_2 (2)Last week, amid the noise and gnashing of teeth that is my Facebook page I noticed the news of a truly interesting new apostolate dedicated to promoting the rosary with strong conviction, making a bold claim that ‘Real Men Pray The Rosary‘.  What’s more, they are currently running a 33 Day Rosary Challenge to meditate on the human ministry of Christ… one rosary for each of the 33 years that Christ dwelt among us in the flesh.

The mission of this program immediately resonated with me.  I have been working on ways to add more prayer to my daily life, ways to focus on the mysteries of Christ, and ways to visibly illustrate my internally held convictions.  The problem: it was May 5.  They were already five days into their challenge and I had only just found out about it.

I thought about waiting until June 1st and starting, but I might lose focus and forget… so I did what any real man would do.  I packed up my daughter and off we went to the park.  She’s a two-year-old so she loves to swing and run around the playground, so she swung and went on the slide, and I prayed four rosaries in the middle of the busy park.  I ignored the sideways glances from the group of six or seven teenagers that had congregated to yell obscenities and talk about their latest romantic conquests (I’m being charitable in that assessment, by the way) and carried right on with it.  Eventually the teens dispersed, probably because of the weird guy praying in public.  I’m ok with that.

I picked up the fifth rosary that I needed to catch up later on that night, and have settled into a nice routine of praying the rosary before bed.  Twice this week, I had the good fortune of praying the rosary before my Knights of Columbus meetings.  It’s a very powerful thing, sitting amongst a group of men all praying the rosary.  On Monday I found out that one of my friends, a fellow Sir Knight of Columbus, had entered hospice care so my rosaries this week were dedicated to his strength, the strength of his family, and for God’s Will to be done for him.

This week I have found myself meditating on the mysteries of the rosary a little bit more during the day.  I don’t know if this is simply because I’m becoming more familiar with them or because I am thinking about difficult things like the illness of my friend, but I feel that this 33 Day Challenge is already having a positive effect.

I will join my voice with those that run the apostolate… get those rosary beads out of the drawer and pray them this month!  Don’t worry about catching up, if it had been any later in the month I probably would have just started on an arbitrary day and counted out my own 33 day interval.  I mentioned before that I have a problem remembering the Mysteries, but that doesn’t have to trouble me any longer.  I grabbed the Laudate app (available on iTunes and Android) and discovered that it has an interactive rosary that you can pray anytime and it lists the Mystery of the day on there.  If you don’t have a smartphone, I am sure that your local Church or Knights of Columbus Council has little cards that list the prayers and the Mysteries.  If you’re lucky, they might even have a spare rosary for you too.

Real Men Pray The Rosary and you can too!

05/2/13

Saint Athanasius: A man for today’s Church

AthanasiusToday is the feast day of Saint Athanasius, the 20th bishop of Alexandria who lived from c. 296 – 373.  He is best known for his strong convictions and his lead role in the First Council of Nicaea against the Arian heresy in 325.

At the root of the Arian heresy was the holding that Jesus Christ is of a different substance (separate) from God the Father.  Athanasius proved himself to be a pillar of strong theology and orthodoxy, holding fast to the truth of the divinity of Christ.  Athanasius engaged in this struggle against the Arians for most of his life and this earned him five official exiles from four different Roman emporers, not including six more instances where he was forced from Alexandria for his own personal safety.

I first became acquainted with the virtues of Saint Athanasius through his famous quotation:

If the world goes against Truth, then Athanasius goes against the world.

I believe that his wisdom applies directly to the situation we find ourselves in today as a Church.  Today (at least in the United States), we have a legion of under-catechized, lukewarm Catholics that do not know the tenants of their Faith.  They allow themselves to be molded not by the Truth, but by a secular culture that wants everyone to “get along to get along” and in doing so distorts the actual teachings of Jesus.  This leads people toward the dangerous precipice of a life lived apart from Christ.

The quotation above should be the clarion call of all faithful Catholics.  We are called to be witnesses of the absolute Truth of Christ even if that causes us persecution, exile, pain, or death.  Saint Athanasius embodied these virtues throughout his life, and I can identify with the necessity of such conviction.  It is easy for us to be steamrolled by popular opinion, political tides, or well-intentioned but ignorant friends and family.  Our goal, following in the footsteps of this great saint, is to be educated in the Faith, to recognize the Truth, and to accurately and ardently present that Truth to those that would erode or ignore it.

Saint Athanasius, pray for us!

05/1/13

Eucharistic Adoration

MonstranceI was blessed to attend the 111th Colorado State Knights of Columbus Convention last week.  It was an action-packed four days of prayer, fraternity, and experiencing new ways to exercise the virtues of charity with my Brother Knights.  I decided to participate in the three Honor Guards for the weekend, which means that I spent a large portion of those several days dressed in my Fourth Degree regalia (tuxedo, chapeau, baldric, cape and sword).

At the end of the second day of events, I had just participated in the Fourth Degree Grand March and banquet.  From the practice session to the end of the banquet was about four hours, so I was really looking forward to getting back to my hotel room for a little relaxation.  After getting out of my formalwear, I took a look at the schedule for the next day and noticed that there was one more event listed for today: Eucharistic Adoration from 9 pm to 10 pm.

I glanced at my hotel alarm clock, it was 9:20 pm.

Then came the internal struggle.  I was tired.  I had just taken off my shoes for the first time in the day and gotten into my sweatpants.  I had books that I wanted to read while I was at the convention.  I had to be up at 6 am the next morning, but so did many of the other convention attendees.  I’m almost the youngest Knight here, so I can’t exactly use the “I’m too tired” excuse.  Wait… a lot of the other Knights are a little more advanced in their years and like to turn in early… would any of them stay up to be with the Lord?  If there is any chance that He would be alone, I should go.

By 9:30 pm, I found myself in the conference room just off the hotel lobby.  Thankfully I was not alone, there was an old couple sitting on the righthand side of the aisle and our State Chaplain deep in prayer kneeling on the bare floor to my left with his eyes closed and a rosary draped in his outstretched hand.  I took my place in the empty row in front of the priest, kneeling down and extracting my rosary from the pouch I carry it in each day.  The Lord was there too, in repose in a golden monstrance that was found in a pawn shop and reconditioned by the Knights of Columbus.

At this point I was gripped by how silent the room was.  I heard the old man to my right turn the page in his prayerbook.  The brush of the priests prayer beads as they glanced across the chair back.  I could even hear some raucous party going on a few rooms down, but it was very peaceful here.  As I looked at Our Lord, present in the Blessed Sacrament I was reminded of the peasant’s answer when Saint John Vianney asked him what he was doing during his time adoring the Lord.  The man said “Nothing, I look at Him, and He looks at me.”

After reflecting on that thought for a moment, I decided to at least start a rosary in hopes of finishing it before 10 pm.  Unfortunately, my memory is terrible and I had forgotten the little card that I carry to help me remember the Mysteries of the Rosary for each day.  I spent a few minutes trying to fitfully remember them, then I decided that I would just pray a personal rosary by contemplating the life of Christ with my own prayer intentions for each decade: first for my wife, second for my daughter Eve, third for the repose of my lost unborn baby Jude, fourth for an increase in Faith for my fallen away friends and family, and last for continued strength in my vocation of service.

I opened my eyes, and after they readjusted to the candlelight I realized that the priest and I were the only ones left in the room.  I put my rosary and checked the time, it was 9:59 pm.  I bowed before the Lord and quietly exited the room so the priest could retrieve the Blessed Sacrament from the monstrance in peace.

As I got back to my room and got ready for bed the peaceful quiet of that room went with me.  I was glad that I had overcome my own weakness and laziness to spend a few minutes with the Lord.  I wish I could end every day like this.