Showing results by author "Bob and Penny Lord" in All Categories

Family, if there was ever a Saint who had complete focus in what the Lord was calling him to do, it was St. Peter Julian Eymard. He is called, among other things, Champion of the Blessed Sacrament. He had such an unbelievable singleness of purpose, in his great devotion to the Blessed Sacrament, and desire that eucharist adoration should be practiced worldwide, that he would found an order devoted solely to adoration of the blessed sacrament and the spread of that devotion. That religious order is called Priests of the Blessed Sacrament.

We have been asked to write on lay people who became Saints. As we researched our last book, Visionaries, Mystics and Stigmatists, we found ourselves writing on many saints and blesseds, brothers and sisters who came from a life very much like our own; they never entered the religious life but instead served the Lord right where he had planted them, within their families. St. Frances of Rome is one such saint and visionary.

The tradition of the image of Our Lady of the Gate goes way back, to before the time it was placed in the Chapel above the gate. There are legends supporting that it came to Lithuania by way of Poland in the late Fourteenth Century, when a Polish princess married into a royal Lithuanian family. Her name was Jadwiga. Tradition tells that she was the first one to introduce Roman Catholic practices into what was then primarily an Orthodox country. The Lithuanians welcomed the great love that was projected by the princess for the Mother of God.

Saint Roch, patron of plagues, miracle worker, patron saint of cholera, plague, epidemics, dogs, dog lovers, pilgrims, bachelors, surgeons, and grave diggers, among others. The Lord works in powerful ways. What a time for St. Roch to come back into our lives than now, when the world is in the midst of an epidemic.

The miracle came to be because of faith and the hard work behind that faith. The early settlers to the New World, with hope and determination, laid the foundation of what you see, when you visit the awesome Cap-de-la-Madeleine. But let us begin at the beginning. The French government sent missionaries and explorers to the New World. In 1534, Jacques Cartier took possession of territory and called it New France in the name of the King of France. However, the founding of a permanent colony was not to come about until 1608, when Samuel de Champlain opened a relay station in Québec.

The Shrine of Our Lady of Allotting became very popular towards the end of the 15th century, actually 1489, as a result of a major miracle. A little child, about three years old, had gotten too close to the edge of the river, and had fallen in. Not being able to swim, he drowned. When his mother found the child, she lost control of her senses for a moment, and then heard an inner voice telling her to rush the dead body of the child to the Holy Chapel of Our Lady. She ran for all she was worth to the chapel and laid the body of her child on the altar of Our Lady.

Fatima, the pleas of Our Lady, and the promises of Fatima have been repeated to and embraced by everyone she has touched. A new generation of believers, people like us who were not born when Our Lady gave us this gift, have become completely enthralled by the power of Jesus and the love of Mary, as revealed to us at Fatima.

Bob and I have traveled all over the world, everywhere from the Shrines of the Holy Land to the Shrines of Europe, Mexico, and Canada. But although we had pilgrimaged to Italy many times, we had never visited the land of my ancestors. I think, in all of us, there is an unquenchable thirst to visit the land of our ancestors. For me, that is Sicily. My father was born there and came to this country at age three, and my maternal grandparents' roots were also in Sicily. One year, we decided to pack up our daughter and grandson and find Sicily!

There are many stories that can be told of a mysterious voice warning you of danger, of something or was it someone interfering in the knick of time. As we started to write this book on Angels, we found ourselves remembering incidents in our lives we had long forgotten. Could it be our Guardian Angels reminding us? Why not?

Thirty minute audiobook based on the life of the Eleven nuns of Nowogrodek. Sound interesting? The author thinks so too! Listen to Eleven Nuns of Nowogrodek and learn about Saints and Sainthood.

Did you ever wonder where the Red Cross came from? Did you ever wonder who came up with the concept of the work to be done by the Red Cross and the symbol of the Red Cross? Would you be surprised if we told you that it came to us through a miracle of the Cross? Listen on, brothers and sisters.

She was born with a crippled and paralyzed right arm and a disease commonly called in those days “Scrofula”, which is a form of tuberculosis that affects the neck. In her case, it also made her neck and cheeks malformed and not at all pleasant to look at. At times, she suffered from swelling and open, puss-filled sores. No one knew for sure who her parents were. Laurent Cousin may have been her father, but that was never determined for sure.

St. Thomas Aquinas is so outstanding. The Lord has given him the ability to take very complex matters, such as the differences between animal, human, and angel, and break them down into logical, extremely understandable terms. He was particularly enraptured by angels, as are we. He made a study of them. I have to believe he got a lot of help in his research from the angels themselves, in the form of angelic inspiration, or possibly by a direct line. We pray they will be as kind to us, as we try to explain their culture, and their role in salvation history in general, and in our lives.

St. Paul of the Cross was born Paul Francis Danei, on the January 3, 1694, the second of 16 children. One of his brothers John Baptist would be very instrumental in the work Our Lord had chosen for St. Paul. His parents, although of nobility, were neither affluent nor privileged. Even though the town hall at Castellazzo had once been the family palace, St. Paul's father, a cloth merchant, was always in serious debt.

Sound interesting? The author thinks so too! Listen to History of the Cross and learn about the origin and history of the true cross.

Our Lord has given us such unforgettable gifts in the churches, basilicas, and the cathedrals of Rome. For the purpose of this great Miracle of the Cross, we want to focus in on the magnificent Basilica of St. Paul outside the walls. As you approach the grounds from a distance, you are in awe!

We must give you at least a short version of what happened because everything about the shrine is miraculous. It is truly an extraordinary place to visit. But don't let us forget to tell you about the miracle of the Cross which took place here. It's as remarkable as the account of the translation of the image of Our Lady which came here.

When Our Lord wants a message to get out to his church, he raises up a powerful saint to do the task. Such a saint was Gertrude the Great! She was the one to plant the seed which would bloom through the hands of another powerful saint and visionary St. Margaret Mary Alacoque, four centuries later, and subsequently through Saint Faustina Kowalska in the 20th century, through the Mission of Divine Mercy.

The Lord has given the church many heroes down through the centuries, and each person he gives us is for a specific reason for a specific time, but not only for that time. The 19th century is a perfect example of that. The church suffered greatly during that century, but the Lord knew we needed him to be at our sides to assure us that he would keep his promise that the gates of hell would not prevail against his church.

As we research the lives of saints and other powerful men and women in the church, we sometimes wonder if they were ever given a job description of what was expected of them in their positions and if they had been given the opportunity to say “aye” or “nay”. Did they and do we really have a choice to say “aye” or “nay” to the Lord when he calls us into ministry?