Deeper Truth

Deepertruth: Stand In The Gap With Us And Saint Margaret Mary Alacoque

Stand In The Gap With Us And Saint Margaret Mary Alacoque 10/16/2023
Saint Margaret Mary Alacoque is the patron saint of devotees of the Sacred Heart, of polio patients, and against the death of parents. The devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus was formally recognized and approved by Pope Clement XIII.
She had visions of Jesus, and He taught her Devotion to the Sacred Heart, and First Friday devotions to honor His Sacred Heart. It is because of her visions and life as a Religious, that we have this devotion today. The image of the Sacred Heart is widely revered today, among Catholics everywhere.
In December 1673, while she was praying in adoration before the Blessed Sacrament, Margaret Mary heard Jesus speaking to her. He told Margaret Mary that he wanted to spread the love of his heart through her and that she would reveal to many people the grace he desires always to bestow on humanity.
The Heart on Fire depicts a flaming heart. It can be used to represent passionate love (“burning love”) or intense liking of something.
Margaret Mary was chosen by Christ to arouse the Church to a realization of the love of God symbolized by the heart of Jesus.
Her early years were marked by sickness and a painful home situation. “The heaviest of my crosses was that I could do nothing to lighten the cross my mother was suffering.” After considering marriage for some time, Margaret Mary entered the Order of the Visitation nuns at the age of 24.
 

The Virgin Mary visits Laus, France for 54 years!

Join John Carpenter, Don Hartley and the Deeper Truth research team as they investigate the longest running Marian apparition in history.
In morning of May 1664, after hearing a sermon from the village’s parish priest, Benoite felt a strong desire to meet the Mother of God. Later while sitting in the ruins of an old building, once a chapel, to eat her lunch, she encounters an elderly man, St. Maurice, who tells her to take her flock of sheep to the valley above Saint-Étienne and pointed out a spring where she could get a drink of water, and told her to go to a certain valley in the mountains with her her sheep and she will see the Mother of God.
The next day, Benoite did what St. Maurice instructed and there, for the first of many times, she saw a Lady who was to guide her for many years. She was a beautiful Lady, with a lovely Baby. Benoite, who knew that there was an old limekiln nearby, asked her if she had come to buy a lime. The Lady did not speak and smiled. The smile was so heavenly that Benoite could not get it out of her mind. She could hardly wait to get back the next day. For nearly two months she met the Lady on a daily basis at the same site; the Lady did not speak, but her presence was so delightful that it made Benoite happy just to look at her.
Eventually, as one might expect, the neighbors became curious. They knew that this particular valley offered poor grazing for sheep, and they told Benoite’s employer that she was neglecting her charge for some fanciful visitor. He forbade her to go to the valley again. However, the sheep went by themselves. She tearfully reported this to him and he went with the sheep to prove that she was wrong. After a long, hard day trying to get his sheep out of the rocky valley, which they persisted in entering no matter what he would do, he gave up. The sheep, observed, were as fat as anyone’s sheep.
 
 
 

Deepertruth: Stand In The Gap With Us And Saint Teresa of Avila

 Stand In The Gap With Us And Saint Teresa of Avila 10/15/2023
St. Teresa of Ávila was the first of only four women to have been named doctor of the church. Her ascetic doctrine and Carmelite reforms shaped Roman Catholic contemplative life, and her writings on the Christian soul's journey to God are considered masterpieces.
In The Interior Castle Saint Teresa wrote that: "The Lord represented himself to her, just after she had received Communion, in the form of shining splendour, beauty, and majesty, as he was after his resurrection, and told her that now it was time that she consider as her own what belonged to him and that he would take
As a mystic, Teresa was bombarded with supernatural experiences and visions. Jesus once said to her in a vision, “I would create the universe again just to hear you say that you love me”
St. Teresa of Avila is the patron saint of those who suffer from headaches and migraines, those who are ill, people ridiculed for their religious faith, and Spain. It is unclear why St. Teresa was chosen as the patron saint of those with headaches, since there are no records that she herself was afflicted with them.
Teresa's most famous miracle was the healing of her injured nephew. She performed a miracle after part of a building had fallen on the boy, crushing him and apparently killing him. He was brought to Teresa, and she prayed for him and held him in her arms. A few minutes later, he came back to life.
Teresa lived in an age of exploration as well as political, social, and religious upheaval. It was the 16th century, a time of turmoil and reform. She was born before the Protestant Reformation and died almost 20 years after the closing of the Council of Trent.
 
 

Deepertruth: Stand In The Gap With Us And Blessed Carlo Acutis

 Stand In The Gap With Us And Blessed Carlo Acutis 10/14/2023
In 2020, the Vatican recognized Acutis' first miracle: the curing of a 4-year-old Brazilian boy named Mattheus in 2013. The boy was healed from a serious birth defect called an annular pancreas after he and his mother asked Acutis to intercede asking the Lord to grant a miracle of healing.
He offered his sufferings for Pope Benedict XVI and for the Church, saying "I offer all the suffering I will have to suffer for the Lord, for the Pope, and the Church.” He died on Oct. 12, 2006, and was buried in Assisi, at his request, because of his love for St. Francis of Assisi.
Carlo lived a life of grace and shared his overwhelming experience of God with his peers. He received the Eucharist every day, he attended Holy Mass devoutly daily and would pause for hours in adoration before the Blessed Sacrament.
He researched over 136 Eucharistic miracles that occurred over the centuries in different countries around the world, and have been acknowledged by the Church” and collected them into a virtual museum.

Deepertruth: Stand In The Gap With Us And Blessed Marie-Rose Durocher the saint

Stand In The Gap With Us And Blessed Marie-Rose Durocher the saint 10/13/2023
She was born in a little village near Montreal in 1811, the 10th of 11 children. She had a good education, was something of a tomboy, rode a horse named Caesar, and could have married well. At 16, she felt the desire to become a religious, but was forced to abandon the idea because of her weak constitution.
Blessed Marie Rose Durocher is patron of those who are sick. Today, some 1,000 Sisters of the Holy Names of Jesus and Mary educate children in Canada, the United States, Africa, and South America.
In 1843 she and two other women founded the Congregation of the Holy Names of Jesus and Mary — the first Canadian born teaching Congregation. It is here that she became Mother Marie-Rose because she is named the first Superior General of the congregation.
Canada was one diocese from coast to coast during the first eight years of Marie-Rose Durocher’s life. Its half-million Catholics had received civil and religious liberty from the English only 44 years before.

Deepertruth: Stand In The Gap With Us And Blessed Francis Xavier Seelos

Stand In The Gap With Us And Blessed Francis Xavier Seelos 10/12/2023
When I was stationed in New Orleans serving in the United States Army, I would spend time at St. Vincent de Paul Catholic Church at 3037 Dauphine Street in New Orleans, Louisiana, a shrine dedicated to Blessed Francis Xavier Seelos and meet with pilgrims coming from all over the world. There I encourged them to give thanks to the Lord for the blessings and answered prayer. This was a geat blessing for me to see this active faith in action.
Seelos was born in Fussen in the Kingdom of Bavaria on January 11, 1819, one of 12 children
Having expressed a desire for the priesthood since childhood, he entered the diocesan seminary on September 19, 1842.
He was accepted by the Redemptorists on November 22, 1842, and sailed the following year from Le Havre, France, on March 17, arriving in New York on April 20, 1843. On December 22, 1844, after having completed his novitiate and theological studies, Seelos was ordained a priest in the Redemptorist Church of St. James in Baltimore, Maryland.
Although only 48 years old, his influence lasted well beyond his brief lifetime. Father Seelos is the patron of immigrants to the United States; his feast is celebrated on Oct.
Beatified by Pope John Paul II in 2000, Fr. Seelos possessed great mystical gifts due to his life of intense prayer and penance. His innate kindness, understanding and dedication to the needs of the faithful from all walks of life makes him an outstanding model for those in religious life and laity alike.
Francis Xavier Seelos, CSsR (January 11, 1819 – October 4, 1867) was a German Redemptorist who worked as a missionary in the United States frontier. Towards the end of his life, he went to New Orleans to minister to victims of yellow fever.
Zeal as a preacher and a confessor led Father Seelos to works of compassion as well.

Deepertruth: Stand In The Gap With Us And Saint Francis Borgia

 Stand In The Gap With Us And Saint Francis Borgia 10/10/2023
Francis Borgia established a book of rules for the Jesuit order that ensured spiritual and intellectual formation, and an apostolic character. He even was instrumental in the re-establishment of sacred music. Popes wanted to make him a Cardinal but his humility would not allow him to accept such a position.
He died on September 30, 1572, and was beatified in Madrid on November 23, 1624 by Pope Gregory XV. He was canonized nearly thirty five years later on June 20, 1670 by Pope Clement X. Saint Francis Borgia is the Patron Saint of earthquakes.
After fighting in a battle between Assisi and Perugia, Francis was captured and imprisoned for ransom. He spent nearly a year in prison — awaiting his father's payment — and, according to legend, began receiving visions from God.
Today’s saint grew up in an important family in 16th-century Spain, serving in the imperial court and quickly advancing in his career. But a series of events—including the death of his beloved wife—made Francis Borgia rethink his priorities. He gave up public life, gave away his possessions, and joined the new and little-known Society of Jesus.

Deepertruth: Stand In The Gap With Us And Saint Denis and Companions

Stand In The Gap With Us And Saint Denis and Companions 10/9/2023
October 9 is celebrated as the feast of Saint Denis and companions, a priest named Rusticus and a deacon, Eleutherius, who were martyred alongside him and buried with him. The names Rusticus and Eleutherius are non-historical.
This martyr and patron of France is regarded as the first bishop of Paris. His popularity is due to a series of legends, especially those connecting him with the great abbey church of St. Denis in Paris. He was for a time confused with the writer now called Pseudo-Dionysius.
The best hypothesis contends that Denis was sent to Gaul from Rome in the third century and beheaded in the persecution under Emperor Valerius in 258.
According to one of the legends, after he was martyred on Montmartre—literally, “mountain of martyrs”—in Paris, he carried his head to a village northeast of the city. Saint Genevieve built a basilica over his tomb at the beginning of the sixth century.
Saint Denis, the first bishop of Paris, was beheaded in that city in the year 250. According to legend, angels accompanied him as he carried his own head from the place of execution to his chosen burial site, where later the church of Saint Denis was built just outside of Paris.
Again, we have the case of a saint about whom almost nothing is known, yet one whose cult has been a vigorous part of the Church’s history for centuries. We can only conclude that the deep impression the saint made on the people of his day reflected a life of unusual holiness. In all such cases, there are two fundamental facts: A great man gave his life for Christ, and the Church has never forgotten him—a human symbol of God’s eternal mindfulness.
 

The Virgin Mary Returns to France

Join John Carpenter and the Deeper Truth research team as they investigate another appearance by the Virgin Mary -- this time in France in 1652.
1652: Our Lady of Eternal Aid or Our Lady of All Good, Querrien, France. On August 15, 1652, the deaf and mute shepherdess, Jeanne Courtel, then aged 12, was tending her father's flock when Our Lady appeared to her. Jeanne was healed of her afflictions immediately.
On 15 August 1652, Jeanne Courtel a 12-year-old girl, deaf and dumb from birth. while guarding the family’s sheep saw a “beautiful lady” who spoke to her. Thereupon, Jeanne was immediately able to hear and to speak to the great astonishment of all the inhabitants of the village. A few days later, Jeanne saw the beautiful lady again who asked to have the ground dug up near the source of the spring, where the Statue of the Virgin was buried. The wooden Statuette was found at the place indicated,, confirming for the people, the authenticity of the Apparition. There were a total of fifteen appearances of Our Lady with which Jeanne was favoured, until September of the same year. From that time on, pilgrims arrived and numerous miracles were recorded.
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Deepertruth: Stand In The Gap With Us And Saint John Leonardi

Stand In The Gap With Us And Saint John Leonardi 10/8/2023
He was the youngest of seven children born to middle-class parents in DiecimoFrom childhood, he sought solitude and wished to dedicate himself to prayer and meditation. At age 17, he began his ten-year study to become a certified pharmacist's assistant in Lucca. Afterward, he studied for the priesthood and was ordained in 1572
In 1574, he founded a group charged with deepening Christian faith and devotion; this foundation was part of the wider movement of the Counter -Reformation. Leonardi worked with this group to spread devotion to the Blessed Virgin Mary and devotion to the Forty Hours, as well as spreading the message of the importance of frequent communion.
He became interested in the reforms instituted by the Council of Trent, and he proposed a new congregation of secular priests to convert sinners and to restore Church discipline.
John Leonardi was born at Diecimo, Italy. He became a pharmacist's assistant at Lucca, studied for the priesthood, and was ordained in 1572. He gathered a group of laymen about him to work in hospitals and prisons, became interested in the reforms proposed by the Council of Trent, and proposed a new congregation of secular priests. Great opposition to his proposal developed, but in 1583, his association (formally designated Clerks Regular of the Mother of God in 1621) was recognized by the bishop of Lucca with the approval of Pope Gregory XIII
“I am only one person! Why should I do anything? What good would it do?” Today, as in any age, people seem plagued with the dilemma of getting involved. In his own way, John Leonardi answered these questions. He chose to become a priest.