My Saint BFFs

It has been an exciting first few weeks at Seton Hall and great first week back with all of the students and staff back on campus. It’s crazy what a difference a year makes. Melissa (my Varsity Catholic teammate) and I have felt so welcomed in by the athletic department this year. Not to say that we weren’t last year, I guess what I’m saying is that last year was a little intimidating approaching some of the coaches and athletic department staff. This year I have not felt that way at all.


My daily prayer has consisted of a crazy, legit, and zealous for souls combination by reading Visits to the Blessed Sacrament & the Blessed Virgin Mary by St. Alphonsus Liguori and Set All Afire by Louis de Wohl which is about the ministry of my new favorite saint, St. Francis Xavier. Let me tell you more about this combination.

St. Alphonsus totally gets me grounded and focused on serving and living for God only and completely, I get in the mindset that everything I do, everything must be done for God and for the furthering of His Kingdom. Then I read Set All Afire which is St. Francis Xavier demonstrating one of the greatest, if not the greatest, examples of doing everything for the glory of and building of the Kingdom of God in the name of His Son Jesus Christ. In this post I want to share a few excerpts from each book, share my thoughts and challenge myself and anyone reading to take a step further (or 1st step) in your daily evangelization, after all that is what we’re called to do as baptized Christians (evangelize/set all afire).

First, let’s get grounded. This excerpt is from the 19th visit, “Oh, if only I could remain in Your presence always to adore You and make You acts of love! I beg of You to arouse me from my lethargy whenever, because of coldness or preoccupation with worldly affairs, I neglect to visit You.” From the 20th visit “…to wash from our souls all the stains of sin that remain after the faults of the day. When any one of us commits a fault, is there any better remedy than immediately to go to Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament?” And “No, it is not just or fair that one who is so good and lovable as You should receive so little love.”

And now, St. Francis, this excerpt is when he is meeting with a Brahman in India who believes in the idea that people are in a caste system, that there several gods, and that (if I understand correctly) people in a lower caste can offer sacrifices to this Brahman to improve their standing in the sight of the gods. The Brahman then attempts to bribe St. Francis with gifts (so that St. Francis will stop preaching to Paravas in this area). To which St. Francis stands right up to and says (through a translator) “I have no intention to be bribed by you or by anybody else. Truth makes no bargain with error. Take your presents. I cannot accept them. I shall not rest until all Paravas have become the servants of the one, true God. And I tell you that many of them whom you call low caste dogs are more pleasing in the site of God than those who strut about as you do, believing themselves to be so high and exalted. Instead of parading your arrogance before men, evoke in yourself humility towards God and you too will be pleasing in His eyes.” Then the Brahman again insists that St. Francis take the gifts. To which St. Francis replies, “all the wealth of India will not change the law of the one, true God and the will of His servant.” The Brahman then leaves and St. Francis’s interpreter becomes….well scared. But again St. Francis, unwavering says, “What else can there be between truth and lie? And what do we have to fear? If God wants us to go on spreading His holy law, all the Brahmans in the world won’t be able to stop us. And if God wants us to die, how could we possible live? They can do nothing?”

St. Alphonsus, just nails it every day for me. More or less that I am unworthy, I need to rely on Jesus (more), I need to visit Him in the Blessed Sacrament more (as the saints did so fervently while being so present and so committed), and I need to live in a way that is serving God only and completely. But as the first excerpt above from St. Alphonsus says, I too easily become lethargic, caught up in worldly affairs and somehow justify to myself that either I don’t need to visit Jesus or that it is ok for me to become distracted while I am with Him. It pains my heart when I see someone not reverently approach the Eucharist or when someone could be more reverent during Eucharistic adoration. Yet every day I fail and neglect Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament as well. The pain that I feel must be a sliver compared to the pain that Christ must feel when I (or anyone) neglect Him. Why are we so hesitant and reluctant to give Jesus as little as an hour of our time!

As a FOCUS missionary it is in our job description to attend daily mass and pray a daily hour of adoration. Lucky for us at Seton Hall, with 40 plus priests on campus, we get Jesus Christ exposed in the Blessed Sacrament every day. I’ve realized that early this year that for the past year I have approached this time of adoration too much like only a job requirement, not being as present as I could be, not truly honoring and adoring our Savior. St. Alphonsus Liguori and St. Francis Xavier have helped me to more truly and more deeply experience Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament.

St. Alphonsus and St. Francis Xavier, pray for us.

Visits to the Blessed Sacrament with St. Alphonsus Liguori

The feast day of St. Alphonsus Liguori was celebrated this last week on Monday. To be honest I don't know much about him. I have read a few books and devotions that he has written such as the Complete Consecration to Mary and have dabbled in a few others. The day after his feast day I went to mass and then stayed for Eucharistic Adoration. On my way into the adoration chapel I grabbed a devotional at the door. As I started to page through it in the chapel in the presence of Jesus I loved what I was reading, it was so honest and so challenging to me. The small devotional were some writings by St. Alphonsus. As I left the chapel I struggled to decide if I should take the devotional with me or leave it there for someone else to experience his great wisdom and challenges. Since there was only 1 of the books left on the table I decided to leave it. I left and wished that I would have kept it to use again during adoration.

I went home, moved some stuff around in my bedroom and came across a few books that I had purchased earlier this summer. One was by Pope Benedict XVI and the other was by St. Alphonsus Liguori titled "Visits to the Blessed Sacrament", the full version of the book I was just reading, thank you Jesus. The book has 31 reflections on visits to the Blessed Sacrament, meant to be used for an entire month as one visits the Blessed Sacrament. Each day there is also a spiritual communion professed as well as a reflection called "visit to our Lady."

Today is my 5th visit using the book and it has helped me to be more spiritually and mentally present during my visits to the Blessed Sacrament. For the next month I want to share some of my favorite excerpts from the book here on my blog.

I want to start with the "instructional" of the book. Before the 1st visit there is a section on how to use the book. Directly before the 1st visit there are 3 writings that one will recite each day, they are titled; "Prayer before each visit", "Spiritual Communion", and "Prayer to Our Lady after each visit." Today I want to share the Spiritual Communion prayer. I have prayed the prayer before, but without any knowledge of what it meant, who started it, or why even do it. For the last 5 days I have prayed it slowly and lovingly. Here is the prayer: "My Jesus, I believe that You are present in the Most Blessed Sacrament. I love You above all things, and I desire to receive You into my soul. Since I cannot now receive You sacramentally, come at least spiritually into my heart. I embrace You as if You were already come, and I unite myself wholly to You. Never permit me to be separated from You." There are many graces that come from a spiritual communion as revealed by our Lord to Blessed Jane of the Cross when He told her that each time she communicated spiritually she received a grace of the same kind as the one that she received when she really received communion. Blessed Agatha of the Cross would visit Jesus 200 times a day. Father Peter Faber (the 1st companion of St. Ignatius) said that it (making spiritual communion) was of the highest usefulness to make Spiritual Communions in order to receive sacramental Communion well.

As I've read more I've realized how too often we as Catholics take this incredible gift for granted. This book is helping me to realize that gift, express thanks, and be more faithful to making a spiritual Communion daily. I'm going to stop here to head to church to make a Spiritual Communion before I receive Sacramental Communion. I look forward to sharing excerpts and nuggets of wisdom from St. Alphonsus Liguori this next month. God bless you.

St. Alphonsus Liguori, pray for us!

Spiritually Impacted

This past weekend I had the opportunity to attend a Spiritual Impact Retreat in Emmitsburg, Maryland at Mount St. Mary’s University. I committed to attending the retreat earlier this semester, not really sure what I was getting myself into. I have led a few retreats and even a mission trip the past few years, but I can’t remember the last time I went to a retreat just to be filled. The past few weeks I gradually grew more excited as the retreat got closer.

I arrived at the retreat site on Friday night with my fellow FOCUS teammates and one student from Seton Hall. Several FOCUS schools on the east coast attended with students, in all I would guess about 30-40 people were on the retreat. It’s always great to go somewhere that there is going to be missionaries from other schools. We spend a month together during the summer growing so close spending day after day together and then we’re sent to every corner of the country, it’s great to reunite with such joy filled people. (And fun to meet students they’ve been working with!)

Early Saturday morning before the retreat started at breakfast I heard a few missionaries discussing what the retreat was going to be like, one had been on the retreat before and one had not. The person that had attended said that the retreat is a lot of intense prayer and even some healing. The person who had not attended asked him what he meant. He said that people are overcome by the spirit and presence of God; hands in the air, people falling to the ground, healings taking place. When I heard this I was a little skeptical of the possibility of the last 2 happening in a legit and unforced way(people doing it for show). Nonetheless, I wanted to remain open to everything that I would see, hear, and experience during the weekend.

The retreat began with 2 talks; 1 about the Holy Spirit and 1 on God’s Love. I soon realized that I’m very unaware of what these things are on a deeper level; this realization really set the tone for the weekend. I was eager and excited to see how God was going to work in my heart if I let Him.

Lately I’ve been struggling with feeling loved by some very important people in my life. I know they love me, but sometimes it’s just nice to feel it and see it more. After the first 2 talks I really felt like I just needed to let God love me. Some of the men and I talked about this and that as men, we sometimes find it difficult to let ourselves be loved by others, even by God. I knew there was some connection between the people that I’m longing to be loved by and needing to allow myself to be loved by God.

The next 2 talks were on evil spirits & healing. Following the talks we were given some reading materials. During the talks and after I received the reading materials I thought about how I had let the evil one into areas in my life in the past. The devil has mostly attacked me by way of sexual sin; lust & fornication. Meaning that in the past, in my mind I have justified these acts as OK to be engaging in. Certainly there have been other ways I’ve allowed the devil in, but this area of sexual sin is something that I have a lot of regret about and have not fully forgiven myself for my past actions. I know that God is all Loving & forgives us for all our sins, but my human stubbornness has gotten (and still gets) in the way of always accepting that.

Next on the schedule was “adoration, praise & worship, laying on of hands.” I was looking forward to 2 of those 3. I was a little hesitant towards the phrase laying on of hands, but really I shouldn't have been, didn’t Jesus and the disciples do this for all different kinds of healing? To add with my discomfort at the situation, (very selfish of me & petty) we cleared the chairs and we would kneel or sit on the floor. I stood at the back of the chapel until I saw some space that I thought I could spread out in. When I got to this space in the front of the chapel, it wasn’t as much space as I thought and could not even see Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament, but I figured that I knew He was present. At this point there were 4 pairs of people going around the room praying for people (the laying on of hands part). 3 pairs were a man and a woman while 1 pair was two women. I started silently praying that no one would come to me to pray. But they did, and it was the pair of women. They asked if I would like to be prayed for, I couldn’t say no. They put their hands on me and began praying, just calling on the name of Jesus. And once I stopped worrying about the words that were being said and focused on Jesus, I was at peace.



In a recent blog I wrote about having a euphoric tingling feeling when I was prayed for when I was in Mexico, I experienced that again this weekend, but in a whole new way. I have no idea how long the women prayed for me or what they all said, but I felt Jesus present the entire time. Once they left, I was praying that another pair of people would pray for me. That didn’t happen but I did have almost two whole hours after the first pair left to pray on my own. Near the end of this time I rolled my head back, looked above me, and realized that the entire time I was underneath a statue of the Virgin Mary. This may not seem like a big deal, except that I’ve been praying to Mary, asking her to ask her Son, Jesus, who she is with in Heaven, to give me the strength to overcome my lustful desires and regret of my past. And then I realized what shirt I had put on that morning, the shirt is the picture you can see above. Through this series of events; 2 women praying over me, being under a statue of Mary, and wearing that shirt, I really sensed God’s forgiveness for my past sexual sin that I’ve been hanging on to. The fact that God sent two women to pray over me when it was women that I have used in the past and the sense of answered prayer from the Virgin Mary, but most importantly from her Son, our Lord, Jesus. I finally feel healed of those actions and have great thanks for Jesus and His Love and forgiveness.

That was not all the spiritual impactivity (word/sp?) that happened this weekend, but all that I care to fit into one entry. So stay tuned for more spiritual impact to be posted soon. Until then, VERSO L’ALTO!