First Saturday Parish Rosary at St. Anthony of Padua Church, 1/7/2017

It felt nice to be back in our Day Chapel today praying the Holy Rosary as a group; our first First Saturday Rosary for Peace in 2017.  There's always something very comforting about starting off an important endeavor with prayer; having God bless it... and this year could be very important, indeed, for all of us, especially with a new [and often controversial] American President being inaugurated soon and the 100th Anniversary of Our Lady's apocalyptic appearances in Fatima looming just around the corner in May. Continued prayer and blessing for the world was definitely in order.

So today we did just that - offered a heartfelt prayer for the world... and there was a big turn-out in parishioners, which is always a welcomed sight. As with all our monthly rosaries here at St. Anthony of Padua Parish, our gathered participants prayed in spiritual union with Our Lady and a "Saint of the Month".  This month our featured Saint was St. Charles of Sezze, whose relic was also present with us in the chapel (read about him here).  Being that he was a profoundly Eucharistic Saint, in a particularly unique manner, the lesson I emphasized to the audience had to do with the true and miraculous presence of Christ in the Blessed Sacrament.

You see - St. Charles of Sezze had once prayed fervently to God for the grace to experience Divine Love on a much deeper level and, significantly, the Lord chose to answer the saint's prayer during a Mass; when the priest elevated the Eucharist during the consecration, a blazing beam of light shot forth from the Host into the saint's chest.  The experience not only opened a stigmatic wound on St. Charles' torso but it also left him delightfully filled with an overwhelming sense of God's love for him, as well as inflamed with love towards our Savior.  Surely, from this remarkable event from our saint's life, we are reminded that the Lord communicates his Divine Love to the rest of us, too, in just as real a manner through the Blessed Sacrament.  There shouldn't be any doubt about it.

So with the Lord's grace and permission we hope to continue praying every month of this year, as we head towards our 7th year prayer anniversary in October.  In the meantime, all are welcome to pray with us - the next Rosary for Peace will be offered on Saturday, February 4th, beginning at 4:25pm.

Happy New Year to all and may God grant us a peaceful and prosperous 2017!