Legion of Mary Philadelphia Senatus

Southern American poet Archibald Rutledge wrote that one day he met a man whose dog had just been killed in a forest fire. Heartbroken, the man explained how it happened. Because he worked outdoors, the man often took his dog with him. That morning, he left the animal in a clearing and gave him a command to stay and watch his lunch bucket while he went into the forest. His faithful friend understood and did exactly that. Then a fire started in the woods, and soon the blaze spread to the spot where the dog had been left. But the dog did not move. He stayed right where his master had said, in perfect obedience. With tearful eyes, the dog’s owner said, “I always had to be careful what I told him to do, because I knew he would do it.”

The inspiring loyalty and obedience of a dog – who did what he was told to do and who was faithful to duty, no matter what – opens our consideration today on the meaning of, the rationale behind, and the role model for the practice of obedience in the Legion.  In other words, I would to reflect today on the “what,” the “why,” and the “who” of Legionary obedience.

Regarding the “what” or the meaning of obedience, the Handbook defines this virtue as the “fruit of loyalty” and the “readiness to accept situations and decisions” (H, 171) linked to our Legion life with its double demand: submission not just with our bodies, but also with our hearts.  This means that members, in a “spirit of heroic and sweet docility to proper authority of every sort” (H, 171), must physically do what the Legion system, the Legion Handbook, and the Legion officers ask.  At the same time, they must also “accept [all of it] cheerfully” (H, 171).  And this means more than a grudging adherence or a “going through the motions” in embracing duty, but engaging everything – even that which one may not like or agree – with joy and without the least evidence of attitudes, such as “I don’t like this” or “I don’t agree with this” or “I am only doing this because I have to.”  We must obey with love!

After giving the “what,” the Handbook goes on to indirectly treat the “why” of obedience.  And it does so by appealing to the image of an army and raising the issue of unity.   How effective would a military force be without obedience?  What chaos would result if each soldier did what he or she wanted, acted individually, and only followed the commands he or she liked?  What kind of strategy could be executed if a percentage, feeling they knew better than the officers, decided to try their own plan of attack?  The campaign would end in absolute disaster, and lives would inevitably be lost.  The point and the warning in enlisting this military metaphor is that similar results await the Legion if each member takes any other approach than obedience:  lives – souls – precious to Jesus and Mary could sadly be lost because members did not “attack” in unison, abiding by Legion discipline.  And this is something the Legion and the Christian cannot afford.

Lastly, there is the “who” of obedience or identifying a role model of living out this virtue.  Several years ago, Fr. Bede McGregor, spiritual director of the Concilium Legionis, gave a beautiful allocutio on Mary’s Fiat at the Annunciation.  In it, he remarked that “[The Holy Trinity] built salvation, not only on [Mary’s] body, but on her will, as well.”   Fr. McGregor’s words remind us that Mary is the model of the Legion’s doubly-demanding obedience.  After all, she not only gave God her body as “the handmaid of the Lord” (Lk 1:38), but she also gave Him her heart when she declared “let it be done to me according to your word” (Lk 1:38).  In this, Mary becomes our Legion template in “doing whatever Jesus tells us” (cf. John 2:5).  Just as Mary physically carried out the Lord’s plan AND did whatever was asked of her with a spirit that “rejoiced in God, [her] Savior” (Luke 1:46), so should we.

Legion members, that is the “what,” the “why,” and the “who” of Legionary obedience.  How well are we living this?  Do we do what we are asked – by the Handbook, by the Officers, by the Church by the Spiritual Director?  Are we doing it all with loving, joyful acceptance – which means without complaint, comment, or compromise?  We may not always like our assignments, we may not always agree with the list of approved Legion works, we may not always find the Legion system palatable in parts, and we may not always understand a certain teaching or caution on the part of the Magisterium.  We may even think that “we know better” and give into the temptation to start doing things our own way, believing it does not matter.  But it does matter.  For the same rationale that justifies disobedience in small things will soon justify disobedience in larger things.  That will only lead to disobedience in all things … and disarray in our fight for souls!

I want to conclude today with the words spoken by St. Padre Pio on this very topic:   “Where there is no obedience, there is no virtue.  Where there is no virtue, there is no good.  Where good is wanting, there is no love, there is no God.  And where God is not, there is no Heaven.”  And, friends, from what we know of the Handbook, where “obedience is not,” neither will the Legion be!  May obedience – our “dogged” fidelity to what the Legion asks us to do – be the cement that keeps our Legion edifice standing and strong!

Philadelphia Senatus, Rev. Frank Giuffre

Sunday, March 19, 2017

Reading: Handbook, Chapter 29/”Legionary Loyalty”

The Man of La Mancha had his “impossible dreams.”  (“The Impossible Dream” [The Quest] is the name of the famed song from that musical.)  We, as Legion members, come face to face with our “impossible dreams,” too: feeling the desire to see some good accomplished, yet experiencing frustration because every attempt to make that good materialize has failed –with little or no hope of success remaining.  Consider these examples.  I want to convert a faithful Muslim, but he has told me that he will never, ever, ever consider becoming a Christian.  I have tried to bring a person in an invalid marriage back to the Church, but the woman has made it clear that she does not want an annulment or the Church’s sacraments again – period.  I would like to invite the eighty percent of my Parish who have “fallen away” back to Sunday Mass, but I am only one person.  I want to have a recruiting drive for active Legion members at my church, yet the last five have yielded absolutely no interest at all.

The Legion Handbook among its “Cardinal Points” in chapter 39, part four (on “Symbolic Action”), acknowledges the reality of such “impossible dreams” and, more importantly, gives members insight as to how they should be understood and approached.  Two particular points raised in that section are worthy of our consideration.  Firstly, the Handbook asks us to be careful about labeling any situation “impossible,” remembering that nothing is beyond God’s power to accomplish.  Certainly, we have enough proof from the Bible to support such a belief.  There we read on page after page about the incredible feats God was able to perform in history: like getting Israel through the Red Sea (Exodus 14), like bringing a dead boy, laid out for his funeral, back to life (Luke 7), and like Jesus raising Himself from the dead by His power as God (Luke 24).  Each of these instances certainly involved people who thought were in an “impossible” situation:  the Hebrew people, trapped against a body of water and with the Egyptian army in hot pursuit; the widow of Nain ready to bury the son she herself had seen die; and the disciples of Jesus knowing that His body had been in the tomb three days and surely must be decaying.  They likely thought to themselves, “There’s no way out of this one. It’s humanly impossible.”  But did they not learn soon enough that what was impossible for human beings was not impossible for God?   These and the other miracles in the Bible remind us how powerful our God is.  The Handbook is only asking us in the Legion not to forget that this same God is ours.  Since He is, then how could we ever apply the adjective “impossible” to any situation we face?

The second point is equally critical.  Remembering that we have a God who can do the impossible, we must never fail to give God the opportunity to act marvelously by giving up on any situation.  That is what we do when we walk away from the stubborn person, the difficult case, or any other challenging situation: we deprive God of the material to work His miracles!  Think about it: In the Gospels, it was only because the apostles brought forward five loaves and two fish – and did so knowing that it was insufficient for feeding a crowd of such a size – that the Lord was able to multiply that meagre food and make it more than enough to satisfy at least 5000 people (John 6).  In addition, it was only because Mary insisted that the waiters at the wedding feast of Cana fill those jars with water – and to do so, even though she had just been told by Jesus that “His hour had not yet come” – that water was able to become the best of wine and save the celebration (John 2).  When we persevere in our toughest cases, we are giving Jesus “the bread and fish” and “the water” for making a miracle again happen in that instance.  We are giving God the chance, as the Handbook remarks, to “explode the impossibility which is of our own imagining” (H, 287).

St. Francis of Assisi, commenting on the facing of incredible challenges, once counseled, “Start by doing what’s necessary; then [continue by doing] what’s possible; and suddenly you [find yourself] doing the impossible!”  That is the spirit with which Legionaries should approach their “impossible dreams.”  We must rally ourselves never to give up on any given situation, remembering, as St. Gabriel the Archangel said to Mary, “Nothing is impossible for God” (Luke 1:37).  And because of this, nothing should be impossible for a legionary who believes, either.

19 February, 2017: Rev. Frank Giuffre/Philadelphia Senatus

Reading: Handbook, pp. 285-286 [Chapter 39, Section 4/”Symbolic Action”]

Saint Charles Borromeo Seminary – Legion of Mary: Mary, Mother of the Blessed Sacrament Praesidium invites you to the 24^th Annual 

Marian Day.

Speaker:  Rev. Fr. Mark Mary MFVA from EWTN – host of “Life on the Rock”

Theme:  Mary’s Spiritual Motherhood

When: Saturday, March 11, 2017     9 am – 4 pm

Schedule:

9am – Registration

9:30 – conference one– Fr. Mark Mary

11:15 – Holy Sacrifice of the Mass

12:00pm – Lunch

1:15 – conference two – Fr. Mark Mary

2:45 – Holy Hour

Please RSVP before March 1^st  at advancement@scs.edu or 610.785.6270 indicating your name and the number of persons attending with you. A donation of $10 to cover box lunch is requested of lay attendees at the time of registration. Please note: due to scheduling, breakfast and other snacks will not be provided.

Click Here to download Marian Day Poster

Saint Charles Borromeo Seminary

100 E Wynnewood Road * Wynnewood, PA 19096

www.scs.edu

Cathy Rigby. Gymnast Cathy Rigby was the first American woman to win a gold medal in a World Gymnastics Competition, which she did at the 1968 Summer Olympics.

Cathy Rigby was a member of the U.S. Women’s Gymnastics Team in the 1972 Olympics at Munich.  Like other Olympians, her goal was to win a gold medal. And to reach that goal, Rigby trained hard.  When competition-day arrived, she, tense with determination not to let her team and her country down, prayed to the Lord for the strength and the control to get through her routine without making mistakes.   Cathy performed well, but not well enough to have her name among the winners.  She was crushed.  Afterward, Cathy joined her parents in the stands, all set for a good cry. As she sat down, Cathy could barely manage to say, “I’m sorry. I did my best.”  Her mother replied: “You know that, and I know that, and I’m sure God knows that too.”  Then her mother said ten words that Cathy has never forgotten: “Doing your best is more important than being the best.” (From Soundings, Vol. D, # 7, pp. 1-2.)

Those words are full of wisdom for each of us on our Lady’s team.  Indeed, the Legion never asks us to be the best at everything we do:  It only asks us to do our best in everything we do for Jesus and Mary.  The Handbook says as much within the section we read together a few moments ago, dedicated as it is to the topic of “Intensity of Effort in the Legion.”  There we heard the following sentences: “Because one works with Mary and for her so completely, it follows that one’s gift to her must be the choicest that can be offered.  One must always work with energy and skill and fineness” (H, 34).  And “work with energy and skill and fineness” translates into a member’s giving one hundred percent of his or her mind, muscle, and heart in whatever is done within the Legion – viewing what we undertake not as a duty, but as a gift to our Lady.  Just as we would never give something broken or insulting to one we love, so we should never think of giving a sloppy, careless, or partial effort to our beloved Queen and Mother.  Because we prize her, we must wrap every Legion action, whether at the meeting or in the field, with our finest!

Some may think that such an ethic is too demanding or highly unrealistic.  Yet we must consider the fact that such an approach of “giving our best” is definitely supported in the Bible.  In the Old Testament, God did not say, when it came to offering sacrifice, that He would only accept expensive gifts.  Instead the Lord requested that what is given, no matter what its price, be the first and the finest of what one has.  In fact, when the prophets chastise the people for their offerings, it is often not because some were giving simply, but because many were giving cheaply – because they kept the choicest for themselves while turning over to God what they did not want or found defective.  This then underlines the Handbook’s point and rationale on “Intensity of Effort,” for it is asking us not to obsess over the “size” of the gift placed on the altar of the Legion of Mary, but to be more concerned that we present our first and finest.  It knows that the Lord and His Mother deserve nothing less than our best!

Legion members, let us take care to make such an offering.  We do this at our meetings when we arrive on time, pray with concentration, prepare our Handbook readings thoughtfully, take part in the discussions with interest, and write reports which are thorough, instructive, and interesting.  We do this on our assignment when we arrive punctually, accept our roles, put our heart-and-soul into the work, come ready and rested, follow through and follow up on tasks, and do not leave until two hours elapse.  In so many ways in the Legion, it comes down to quality, not just activity, because while activity shows obedience, quality shows love!

Legion friends, let us remember what is most important in our Legion service: not our success, but our generosity.  For indeed what the mother of Cathy Rigby says is true:  it comes down not to being the best, but doing our best – worrying less about attaining all and more about giving our all when it comes to our Legion service.  Doing that will always make us “winners” in our Mother’s eyes!

18 December 2016: Rev. Frank Giuffre/Philadelphia Senatus

Reading: Handbook, pp. 34-35 [Chapter 6, Section 4]

Legion Members: Taking the “Accompanying” Line
20 November 2016: Rev. Frank Giuffre/Philadelphia Senatus
Reading: Handbook, pp. 312-313 [Chapter 40, Section 3, “No! … religion to us!”]

Contemporary Catholic speaker, writer, and evangelist Matthew Kelly often speaks
about his conversion from being a lukewarm Catholic, a fallen away of the Church, to a
dynamic Catholic, a passionate disciple of the Church. We might ask ourselves what made
all the difference and what served to precipitate the change in Kelly’s life. Was it a sermon he heard? A book he read? A Mass he attended? A shrine he visited? It was none of these.

It was rather the intervention of a faith-filled friend who loved Kelly enough to tell him the truth and who also loved him enough to keep in regular contact with Kelly over the long haul, walking him back to the Faith and working with him on deepening his faith. Like a doctor who prescribes to the physically infirm differing dosages of various medicines with each check-up, so this friend counseled Kelly back to spiritual health through continued contact as to the right prayers and practices needed at the right time – first challenging Kelly to stop in a church, then later to read the Gospels, then later to perform a work of mercy regularly (visiting a nursing home), and then later to pray the Rosary daily.

Describing the power this sustained influence had on him, Kelly would say, “[Without the guidance of my friend], I couldn’t have done what I did with my life.”
Kelly’s story and testimony highlights a lesson for Legion members in their effort of
“seeking conversions to the Church.” Definitely, it attests how essential the personal contact of “one soul upon another” (H, 314) is in the approach. But it also reminds us that something more is needed: not one personal contact, but sustained personal contacts, whereby one caring Christian helps a soul over the long haul, guiding him or her step by step along the journey to Christ and to the Church. Such a sustained contact and interaction coalesces with Legion mentality. After all, while the Handbook asserts that the most effective approach in the realm of conversions “must be an individual and intimate one” (H, 312), nowhere does it say that it should be a limited to one – that is, limited to one visit, one conversation, one meeting.
The Legion knows that what is needed for the individual’s spiritual healing is what was
employed for the paralytic’s total healing in Mark 2:1-10. We may recall in that scene how a totally helpless, handicapped man was brought to Jesus – through a packed crowd and a solid roof – by friends who were willing to make the long journey and difficult investment of their energy to see a comrade of theirs made well again. Legion members are called to use the same tactic: to carry those seeking conversion on the “stretcher” of regular visits and interactions, never swayed by obstacles, until these souls finally are led to a life-saving and life-altering encounter with Jesus. This kind of effort will be demanding. It may entail spending a lot of time, experiencing a lot of frustration, seeing very little progress on some days, and wanting to give up on others. But in many cases, it may just be the only hope for one who, like the paralyzed man, would have no other way of reaching Jesus. A Legion friend is needed to see them through!
Pope Francis has made a priority of promoting this approach when speaking on the
topic of evangelization, using the phrase “accompaniment” to describe the process by which believer walks with a potential-believer all the long journey (back) to the Church. He challenges us “to [be] a Church at the side of others, capable of accompanying everyone along the way” (Message, June 1, 2014) with “prudence, understanding, patience and docility to the Spirit” (EG, 171). The Holy Father’s wisdom is marching orders for the Legion that, in assisting those who would convert to the Catholic Faith, we must take, not the company line, but the accompanying line. We must be willing to befriend “broken down” AND journey with those “broken down” the entire way home – and not be content with a single instance of “roadside, emergency service.”