Filipino Catholic Realizes Dreams By Crafting Rosaries

 A young Filipino Catholic wanted to attend the pilgrimage in Poland, but didn't have the money for the trip.  However, God created a way for him to attend using the talent God had given him.  You can find the following article here:

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Mark Carlo Herrera Cruz had about a year to prepare for what he called “a pilgrimage of a lifetime” in Krakow, Poland.

It was already mid-2015 and he was not sure where to get the money for his trip. He needed at least US$2,500 to cover all his expenses.

One evening, Cruz prayed the Holy Rosary and asked God to give him the “strength and resources” needed “to fulfill this mission.”

The next morning, the then-22-year-old native of Batangas province realized that his prayers had already been answered even before he asked for it.

“The answer to my prayers was already in the palm of my hand, the rosary beads,” he said.

Earlier, Cruz got interested in crafting rosaries. He started with simple beads and designs that he acquired in a local bead shop.

So, months before the World Youth Day, “I dared myself to make and sell rosaries.” He said “there was no grand plan.”

“I just took my tools and started crafting,” he said.

After finishing several pieces, he took photos and posted it on his social media account. He later received messages placing orders of his rosaries that were priced at US$7 a piece.

Cruz spent sleepless nights crafting and selling rosaries.

“I was surprised by how people responded,” he said. “I got a lot of inquiries and orders. Honestly, I don’t know how many rosaries I made that year.”

Cruz earned about US$4,000 from crafting and selling rosaries, enough for him to travel to Poland in July 2016.

After the week-long pilgrimage, Cruz thought it was over, still he continued to receive messages from people expressing their interest in his rosaries.

Cruz said he usually spends at least 45 minutes to craft a rosary with a simple design and at least six hours to finish a rosary with intricate and elaborate patterns.

“I can only craft them during weekends and in the evening before going to bed because I have a day job,” he said, adding that it is not a money-making venture.

“Crafting rosaries is a passion,” he said. “Every detail and every bead comes from how I interpret the personality of the person who would use the rosary.”

Cruz said some of his clients are priests, nuns, and members of church organizations, “but a lot of them are individuals, common people, or the lay faithful.”

In 2018, Cruz was again chosen to participate in an international gathering in Rome to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the Neocatechumenal Way, also known as the Neocatechumenate, an itinerary of Christian formation within the Catholic Church.

He was “a little bit confident” that he could fund his next international pilgrimage by crafting and selling rosaries.

“The Holy Rosary again answered my prayer,” he said. He was able to go to Rome.

In recent months, Cruz made more than a dozen hand-crafted habit rosaries for the National Shrine of Our Lady of the Holy Rosary of La Naval de Manila.

The rosaries were placed on images of Dominican Saints and on the image of the Our Lady of the Holy Rosary of La Naval during its feast in October 2019.

He also crafted rosaries that were used for more than 200 religious images in dioceses across the country, including one that was used for the Our Lady of Lourdes of Punta Princesa in the Archdiocese of Cebu.

“I don’t consider rosary-making a business but a charism that is given to me to help spread the devotion to the Blessed Virgin Mary,” he said.

“As a sinner, I used to say that it is my privilege and great joy to be an instrument of someone’s devotion,” he said.

While a simple hand-crafted rosary costs US$7, the price gets higher depending on the design and the materials.

The most expensive piece of the rosary that he crafted sold for about US$300.

In March, Cruz thought orders for handcrafted rosaries would decline because of the coronavirus pandemic, but the demand continued to grow.

“It only shows that the devotion to the Holy Rosary and to the Blessed Virgin Mary is growing amidst the challenges that we are facing because of the pandemic,” he said.––LiCas News

Seminarian on the Road to Vocation

 Deacon Paul Pierce was a catechumen of Father Pius in Hawaii.  Deacon Paul walks in the Neocatechumenal Way and is studying to be a priest.  He still has a long journey ahead of him.  His story is found here.

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Deacon Paul Pierce, one of the first seminarians to study at the Neocatechumenal Way’s Redemptoris Mater Seminary in Hialeah, Fla., gives a tour of the seminary’s many chapels and religious artworks Sept. 2, 2020. (CNS photo/Tom Tracy)

By Tom Tracy Catholic News Service

MIAMI (CNS) — Deacon Paul Pierce, a transitional deacon hoping to be ordained a priest as soon as next year, has been on a long, improbable but faith-filled journey for a young adult.

Born and raised in Maui, Hawaii, he was raised by an agnostic, science-driven father and a New Age-influenced mother steeped in Hindu belief at the time. He was living a typical teen’s life in a tropical paradise — but paradise hadn’t been all that fulfilling, as it turned out.

“How I got to be into the seminary and how I will be ordained a priest very soon, God willing, is a miracle — because I shouldn’t be here,” said Deacon Pierce, 30.

He talked about his vocation and long road to the Neocatechumenal Way’s Redemptoris Mater Seminary in the Archdiocese of Miami in an interview with the Florida Catholic, the archdiocesan newspaper.

Opened in 2011, Redemptoris Mater is situated in Hialeah, adjacent to St. Cecilia Church. It serves as a Florida-based international seminary for the Neocatechumenal Way under the auspices of the Miami Archdiocese.

A decade ago, Deacon Pierce was chosen as one of its first 12 seminarians: men from different countries who study together and are ordained for the local church. But they also commit themselves to serving in whatever corner of the world they are most needed. In tandem with the Neocatechumenal Way’s missionary thrust, they can serve locally or internationally throughout their lifetime.

In Maui, Deacon Pierce recalled a reasonably comfortable upbringing as a well-adjusted student in a household fumbling around for answers to the great questions of life. His parents had moved to Hawaii to be closer to Pierce’s grandmother and neither parent had ever professed any form of Christianity. His mother’s search for a spiritual home took her along widely divergent paths over the course of his youth.

“I was living my life like any normal guy from the island,” Deacon Pierce recalled.

But when his mother and father separated, this triggered a traumatic and difficult period for him. He always longed to be in a family with brothers and sisters but found it difficult to experience family love.

As he grew older, he wondered why he couldn’t love his parents more deeply and if he was maybe “living in a hell of selfishness.”

“Even though I was spoiled, given everything, and an only child who lived in Hawaii, in that ‘American Dream,’ I was very unhappy,” he said. “At a certain point I would do everything for myself: I would study for myself, I would go to the beach for myself, I would go to be with my friends for myself — the islands, the beauty — it was all for myself.”

His mother’s yoga teacher at the time directed her to a local Neocatechumenal Way community, which hosted weekly talks and liturgies in Maui.

Begun in Spain in 1964 by two laypeople — Kiko Argüello and Carmen Hernandez — the Neocatechumenal Way developed a system of evangelizing the residents of one of Madrid’s poorest slums.

Over the years the movement expanded into a network of small, parish-based communities of up to 50 people with thousands of parish communities throughout the world, with an estimated million Catholic members.

Today, there are 102 Neocatechumenal seminaries around the world. There are seven in the United States: Miami,Washington, Denver, Boston, Dallas and Newark, New Jersey, and in Guam.

Deacon Pierce was about 12 when his mother started going to the group’s catechesis. She entered the Catholic Church several years later. His grandmother also would be baptized eventually.

“It was very providential, very unexpected,” he said. “My mom had been searching for a new religion for some time when she kind of rebelled against the new age Hinduism she was raised with.”

Little by little young Paul began to tear himself away from playing video games and other interests to sit quietly at weekly Neocatechumenate talks. He saw the transformative power the group had on its culturally diverse members, imbuing them with a sense of Christian charity and forgiveness.

He attended the talks for a year, stopped for a year, came back and noticed the community started growing.

“I started seeing things I had never seen anywhere else: unity, love, community, forgiveness,” he said.

“For seven years I started walking like that, little by little, listening to the word of God, being with brothers and sisters, seeing forgiveness and reconciliation in front of our eyes, seeing something that held us together that I know now was the Holy Spirit and the love of Christ,” he said.

Then he offered himself for mission in the Neocatechumenate, leading to his baptism, confirmation and first Communion in 2010 at age 19.

He was invited to go on retreat in New York and then was sent to New Mexico, where he was part of a small team of catechists establishing a community in Albuquerque. “I was there helping in parishes, and for the first time in my life, I started to live for someone else, with freedom from money, and with chastity,” he said.

He traveled to World Youth Day events in Germany in 2005 and Australia in 2008. Then came World Youth Day in Madrid with Pope Benedict XVI in 2011, which was a life-changing experience. During down time, the Neocatechumenate members from around the world held large vocation-forming meetings, inviting members to consider making deeper commitments.

“This time my ear was open. If you had asked me a day or even the moment before I felt called to the priesthood I would have said you are crazy,” Deacon Pierce said, adding that he had always envisioned getting married to a Christian girl, starting a family and running a successful entrepreneurial business.

But listening to a talk by Kiko Argüello “announcing the love of God with courage and strength” changed all that.

“In that moment I had a conviction that to do the will of God was my happiness and that I would be happier giving my life as a priest in China or wherever than to do my will and plan for my life,” Deacon Pierce said. “It was a certainty and that still helps me today.”

After a period of discernment in Rome, he was invited to move to Miami and help establish the fledgling Neocatechumenate seminary in October 2011. He has studied at both the minor and major seminaries serving the archdiocese — St. John Vianney in Miami and St. Vincent de Paul in Boynton Beach — and has spent additional time in local missionary service.

Miami Archbishop Thomas G. Wenski ordained him and one other Neocatechumenal seminarian, Alberto Chávez, to the transitional diaconate April 26. If all goes as planned, they will be ordained priests next May.

Political Controversy in the United States

There is much controversy going on in the United States over the 2020 Presidential election.  To this day, we still do not know whether Joe Biden or Donald Trump is the official President of the United States.  News media have been reporting a Biden win even when before the voting was officially concluded.  President Trump is now bringing a lawsuit against certain states because of voting irregularities.  Democracy and the rule of law is important in our society.  We have already seen in our society that the due process of accused individuals have been eroding as they are being judged by the media who can easily sway public opinion.  Public opinion can condemn an innocent person.  It's always best to allow the process and the rule of law to take place and not deprive the person of their individual rights to due process. 

 

The rule of law is important in our democracy.  If there is indeed voting fraud being committed, it must be brought to light otherwise the voice of the people will be suppressed. Voting is sacred and makes democracy what it is  Voting is the will of the people.  Any corruption in the voting system deprives the American people their right to freedom of expression. The following is an interesting video regarding the political controversy surrounding the presidential election.  

Congratulations Junee Valencia

Congratulations to Deacon Junee Valencia.  He will be ordained into the priesthood tomorrow, November 6th at 10:00 a.m. by Archbishop Michael Byrnes in the Dulce Nombre de Maria Cathedral-Basilica in Hagatna.  He is the second person who will be ordained a priest for Guam.  The first priest ordained was Father Honorio Valdeavilla Pangan Jr.  In the NCW, we support and pray for all Catholic priests and bishops. Congratulations!