The day started out spectacularly with Mass in St. Peter’s Square with Pope Francis. Our groups was the first in line among tens of thousands or more. So when the gates were opened we rushed in and got the very front seats and great seats they were. 

Before the Mass the Pope surprised everyone by driving through the crowds in his uncovered Popemobile so everyone got to see him up close again. Everyone got great pictures and videos, some of which you will see in the videos here. The Mass was to celebrate The Day of Life.

After the Mass many of us went to La Pilotta da Mario for lunch and then scattered with our guides for a walking tour of Rome visiting the Pantheon, the Trevi Fountain and the Piazza Navona.

Pope’s Homily

Then we drove out to the Via Appia Antica through the ancient road with catacombs below us. We arrived at Cecilia Metalla for a fantastic dinner outside under the trellises covered with grapevines. During dinner I was the MC and the guides, escorts, John Hale of Corporate Travel, Teresa Tomeo and others gave lasts words and comments. 

Then we had our guest speaker Dr. Frank Beckwith share his story of reversion back to the Catholic Church. During his presidency of the Evangelical Theological Society he decided to return to the Catholic Church. It is a great story and he does a great job telling it.

Then we had to say Good-bye as everyone boarded the buses the next morning and headed to the airport to return home. Janet and I were overwhelmed with the kind words, hugs, grateful praises for the trip and promises to join us again on other pilgrimages. It was a very warm but sad morning as we said “Good-bye.”

Talks and Farewells Part I

Talks and Farewells, Part II

Great Mass this morning with the Pope and hundreds of thousands of Pro-life people to celebrate Life Sunday.

It Was also Harley-Davidson day with thousands of Harley Davidson motorcycles and riders and the pope blessed all their motorcycles.

It was another excellent day with perfect weather and excited pilgrims. We are having an uplifting Week of Life here in Rome. This first video takes you through the Vatican Museum, the Sistine Chapel (clandestinely) and St. Peter’s. It also covers our Mass at Our Lady of Guadalupe Church. 

Video 2 with Steve’s talk on “Martyrdom and Proclaiming the Gospel” and the Candlelight Vigil for Life at St. Peters will be uploaded soon.

Fr. Pavone’s final pilgrimage homily here soon…

Part 2

It was just a normal morning — alarm clock, shower, espresso, dress and a saunter down the sidewalk to work. For Paul is was another day with a whole lifetime ahead of him. But today was different.

Someone else got up this morning too. They had their coffee dressed and jumped in the car. They tried to catch up on their phone calls along the way and didn’t notice the car stopped in front of them. He swerved and his car jumped the sidewalk.

Paul didn’t even have time to blink. The car slammed into him as he walked to work and he was dead. It was over. No time to think. No time to call out to God. He was dead in an instant.

Was he ready? Where is he now? I don’t know.

The other day in Rome I was just out for a run along the same sidewalk. I saw the memorial bolted into the wall with flowers and prayers. Paul’s family hopes he is in heaven. They still bring flowers, light candles and pray at the place he was instantly killed.

I stopped my running. I pondered the memorial — Paul’s picture. He was a young man; looks like about 30 years old, handsome and full of life. Did he leave a wife and kids behind? Was he a church-goer or had he dropped out for more important things?

Flowers, candles, prayers, tears, longing, hope, sorrow, lonliness, regret. All of this was obvious from the remembrance placed on the sidewalk.

I crossed myself, said a prayer for Paul though I have no idea who he was — or is, I should say because life does not end at death but goes on in heaven or hell.

I suspect he didn’t know his life would end at 8:46 AM that morning. Nor did anyone else. Makes one wonder if his life was in order. Had he gone to confession? Did he harbor grudges against family or friends?

As I prayed and meditated a bit on the sidewalk, I thought of my own life and once again realized how fragile we are and how crucial it is to be right with God and the world at all times. We never know when a cell phone call, or an absent-minded driver might snuff out our life.

It’s a good time to take a quick evaluation of your life. Are you ready to die?

For my story The Last Nightmare: the Story of a Soul, click here.

Another banner day! Travestere is a unique and ancient quarter of Rome across the Tiber River. It is where the Jews lived prior to the time of Christ. The first converts in Rome were Judeo-Christians and it was to them that Peter and Paul first visited. 

We had Mass at Santa Maria in Trastevere which is arguably the world’s first church dedicated to the Blessed Virgin. We had Mass with Cardinal Paglia who is President of the Pontifical Council on the Family. He was delightful and charismatic and everyone thoroughly enjoyed the Mass in his ancient basilica and his talk afterwards.

Then we had two hours to roam the streets of quaint Trastevere to eat lunch and shop before heading to the North American College which is the United States seminary here in Rome.

We had a great time with the seminarians, heard several vocation stories and took a tour of the seminary. For many of the pilgrims it was a highlight of the pilgrimage. We took up a free will offering at the end and collected $900 for the five who spent time with us.

Then we had Dr. Liz Lev come to the hotel and for one hour gave the most incredible introduction to the Sistine Chapel using color slides and her amazing whit, artistic knowledge and orthodox Catholic theology. Everyone was in awe.

Then we had attorney Alan Sears present our group with a talk on the dangers in America and how we are losing our freedons, especially religious. The bishop in charge of the Council for Life also addressed our group while we ate a good Friday fish dinner.

Italy is beautiful – bella! Today we left the hustle and bustle of Rome and headed out to the countryside. One bus went to Orvieto with Teresa Tomeo, Janet Morana and new priest Fr. Casey. Orvieto is home to an amazing Eucharistic miracle. 

The other two buses, with me included, along with Fr. Pavone and Fr. Cory, went to Assisi. That is why the video shows a lot of Assisi and none of Orvieto. Sorry, but I could not make videos in both places simultaneously :-)

Again the weather is spectacular, the food delectable, the countryside gorgeous, the company delightful and the experience deeply spiritual. Fr. Pavone’s homilies have been nothing short of profound. 

Today I gave my conversion story on the two buses going to Assisi, Teresa and Janet Morana taped shows for EWTN and it was a day full of adventure. Enjoy.

Fr. Pavone’s homily will appear here soon …

General Audience with Pope Francis

Steve Ray’s talks in two churches

Visit to St. Paul Outside the Walls, Mass with Fr. Pavone at St. John Lateran, Mother Church of the World and dinner with a Prolife Hero.

Fr. Pavone’s Powerful Homily at the Chair of St. Peter coming soon….

The plane arrived only 30 minutes late which was not bad at all. No luggage lost and quickly through passport control and customs. Our friends the Petersons missed a connection but will join us tomorrow.

The weather is great! Rome is full of exciting pilgrims here to see our new Pope Francis. Today we got everyone to our hotels and got settled in before going to Mass at Santa Prassede. This is an ancient church built over an early home church and later a tomb of martyrs.

We had a quick introductory tour of ancient Rome and back to the hotel for our welcome dinner. The second video is part of intro’s by Fr. Pavone, Teresa Tomeo, Janet Morana and Steve Ray (but I didn’t video myself :-)

Tomorrow is a full day starting with the General Audience with Pope Francis in St. Peter’s Square.

The first video is of our first day, the second video shares some introductory comments and such and soon I will have an audio clip of Fr. Pavone’s first and very powerful homily to start the pilgrimage.

Father Pavone’s Powerful Homily HERE soon…..

Rome Day 1, Part 2: The Day

Rome Day 1, Part 2: Opening Comments During Dinner (and Sean and Emily’s Engagement Blessed)

Sean and Emily in Rome

Sean Regan proposed marriage to our daughter Emily Ray on the Bridge of the Angels “crossing the Tiber River” with St. Peter’s Basilica in the background. 

He surprised Janet and I (though we somewhat expected it and have for several years) a few hours before by taking us aside and asking for our daughter’s hand in marriage. 

They are both 21 years old and will be married next year after they both graduate. They have been best friends since their early years at Fr. Gabriel Richard High School in Ann Arbor. Sean has already been like a member of the family for five years. 

We couldn’t be happier!

I love having 11 grandkids (with another on the way and two daughters still to get started!).

Nothing Janet and I love more than being married and still madly in love, having four wonderful children and now being grandparents! 

I often take the grandkids on adventures with our golf cart, driving through the country and into wooded lanes. This time we found an old farm silo which we quickly named the Evil Tower. It got that name because once we saw six turkey vultures sitting on top.

We stopped, walked through the deep weeds and the grandkids excitedly climbed down into the Evil Tower to discover a next of mice. Boy, did they have fun. Enjoy!

Introducing Joseph, young apologist who’s not just sitting around waiting for “someone else to evangelize”, he’s getting out there and doing it himself. Good work Joseph – the humor is great! Where’d you get that accent?

Also check out the website below by and for young people in love with Jesus and his Church!

UPDATE: HERE IS A NEW ONE, THE OLDER ONE IS BELOW.

Click here to visit New Catholic Generation!

It was a fun one hour show. You may have to move through the first ten minutes, but the rest is the interview and we had a good time with a lot of excellent discussion. Enjoy!

Click on the image and then choose the Steve Ray show

Sent from Tim Staples:

HYPOCRISY  IS ALIVE AND WELL: High Fashion  in the Mosques

That’s OK, just don’t burn or deface the Koran or draw a picture of Mohammed!!

Every day shirts like this are mass produced, marketed and sold by street vendors throughout the Middle East and it’s  ”Simply  OK.”

The  mass-murder of 9-11 is a celebrated event by millions of Muslim people.

Funny how racism and offending other races only applies to  ”Non Muslims”!

This week Catholic World Report has a biting article about the recent decision to allow openly gay “youth” to join the “Boy” Scouts. You’ll see why I put these words in quotations marks as you read.

Here is an excerpt:

 

The Boy Scouts of America have long ceased to speak the language of Christian or Jewish or solid old Roman virtue.  They, like the schools, have veered away from any of the specifics of expertise, like teaching boys how to shoot a rifle or how to find edible plants in the woods, or, from my March 1, 1911 issue of Boys’ Life, the first issue ever printed, how to drive cattle across the outback of Australia. 

There was only one reality that kept them reasonably sane when all the world around them had gone quite mad, and that was the boy.  And now that one reality has been forgotten.

There’s one word in that official statement that is conspicuous by its absence.  It’s boy.  The word appears in the name of the organization, just as young, men, and Christian appear in the name of the YMCA, even though that organization is now largely a consortium of secular day-care centers and health spas for middle class families and the elderly.  The Boy Scouts of America are apparently no longer about boys.

I am aware that girls are admitted to some of the Scouting programs for adolescents.  That doesn’t change the nature of this abandonment.  For if the Boy Scouts of America had remembered that they were, first of all, the Boy Scouts and not the Youth Scouts, they might just have remembered also the realities of sex – that is, of being a boy, and not a girl, or a neuter.

To read the whole article, click here.

***************************************

Boy Scouts waste no time – march in gay pride parade

I was quite impressed. He is far ahead of me when I was sixteen years old. Christian is a young man who just sent me his first apologetics video. I was only the second person to watch it. Take a look and leave a comment sharing what you think.

By the way, do we Catholics worship saints and statues and Mary?

Article HERE. 

In John 6:1-14 it says Jesus fed 5,000 men plus women and children. When Jesus fed the 10,000+ people, he didn’t really do a miracle, right?

He just taught everyone to care and share, right? You’ve probably heard that homily, right?

The people had all brought picnic baskets which they kept hidden up under their robes.

Jesus convinced them all to pull out their picnic baskets to share with everyone else. The REAL miracle was not multiplying loaves and fish, but in teaching selfish people to share.

Isn’t that sweet? And after they shared their food Jesus taught them all to sing “Kum Ba Ya” and they joined in the liturgical dance. A good time was had by all! Or so say some trendy homilists!

Click here for more info or to buy, only $5

***Click on the image to learn more about Steve’s talk DEFENDING THE EUCHARIST: YOU ARE WHAT YOU EAT ***

Well I had ENOUGH of that nonsense. I sat at Mass on Corpus Christi Sunday and heard the priest insult the intelligence of everyone in the church. He also insulted the Word of God and the tradition of the Church. He twisted the Gospel reading like a rubber nose.

I almost stood up to protest but my good wife said, “Steve, no! Go home and write!” So I did.

About 12 pages later I had written a very thorough response to the trendy priest and to all others who preach this nonsense. I sent a copy to the priest, to his bishop and to Catholic Answers. It was then published in the January 2008 issue of THIS ROCK Magazine.

I hope this thorough rebuttal of nonsense will be copied and given to very homilist who insults us with such pablum. Hopefully we can put this insulting claptrap to bed once and for all.

For the whole article in THIS ROCK click here. My book CROSSING THE TIBER deals extensively with the Eucharist in the Old and New Testaments and the first five centuries of Christianity. You can learn more here.

Gary Michuta is an expert on the canon of Scripture, especially in regards to the Deutero-canonical books, what the Protestants call the Apocrypha. You can read his book Why Catholic Bibles Are Bigger to see what I mean.

Recently a friend asked Gary for the short answer as to why the Protestants removed seven books from the Bible. Here is his very helpful reply:

Why Protestants Reject the Deutero-canonical Books – Short Answer

By Gary Michuta

 The short answer is this: When Luther was cornered in a debate over Purgatory, his opponent, Johann Eck, cited 2 Maccabees against Luther’s position. Luther was forced to say that Second Maccabees could not be allowed in the debate because it wasn’t canonical. Later in the debate, Luther appealed to St. Jerome for rejecting Maccabees (the councils of Carthage, Hippo, and Florence all included Macabees as canonical Scripture). 

 By appealing to Jerome, he also rejected all the other books Jerome rejected (Wisdom, Sirach, Baruch, Tobit, Judith, 1st and 2nd Maccabees, Daniel 13, and sections of Esther).

From then on, Luther (and all Protestants) have been trying to justify this removal. Luther in 1534 thought Baruch was ”too skimpy” and not lofty enough to be from the scribe of Jeremiah. He also had problems with certain historical elements in Baruch. But in the long run, it really came down to Jerome’s rejection.

 As a side note, Jerome rejected it because he thought that a Hebrew manuscript tradition, known as the Masoretic Text, was identical to the inspired originals and all other copies were made from this text. Since the Deuteros were not part of the MT, he rejected them as not being of the canonical Scripture. 

 What Jerome could not have known was that there were many different Hebrew manuscripts in circulation during the first century and that the Greek Septuagint, a translation made by the Jews around 200 BC, at least in parts, appears to be a very literal translation of a more ancient Hebrew text tradition that is now lost. 

This means that Jerome’s idea of “Hebrew truth” (I.e., only that which is found in the Hebrew MT is true) has been demonstrated to be an error. With Jerome’s position no longer tenable, Protestantism really doesn’t have a historical leg to stand on in regards to their OT canon.

Friday is the Feast of the Visitation. I will be doing two radio shows on the Visitation of Mary when she traveled about 100 mile to visit her relative Elizabeth – pregnant!

Very few Catholics (and almost no Protestants) understand the Mary is the Ark of the New Covenant with the Word of God inscribed in flesh in her womb. (see Chart below.)

Here is my article on Mary, Ark of the New Covenant.

Click here to see more

Join me on Relevant Radio with Sean Herriott at 7:00 AM Eastern and Ave Maria Radio with Al Kresta at 5:30 PM Eastern.

Click here to learn more about the DVD

Join us on a pilgrimage to see all this and more for yourself. Steve Ray will be your guide.

Steve’s Talk: Mary, Real Girl & Woman of Mystery

Steve’d DVD filmed on location in Israel: Mary, Mother of God

Click on picture for larger image.

Our next DVD in the Footprints of God series will be entitled “Abraham, Father of Faith & Works.” We will begin filming in Iraq — in Ur of Chaldees — which is the home of Abraham, just south of Baghdad (Gen 11:28-31).

Thanks to the Biblical Archaeology Society to which I subscribe, we can now listen to music that Abraham listened to.

Click here to listen to The Music of Ur, a musical duet featuring a lyre and double pipes such as those found at the ancient city of Ur. Click here to to learn more about these instruments and the music from that time period.

Enjoy! And you will hear this kind of music on our next Footprints of God DVD. If you want to help with a tax deductible donation click here. But do please pray for us.

For the year 2013 I just passed the 500 mile mark today! Whew! I might hit 1,200 miles this year. Janet just hit a personal record today of 30 miles on the bike.

Five years ago Janet and I decided to change our lifestyle. It would mean 1) daily exercise, 2) cutting our diet in half, and 3) eating only healthy natural foods.

Janet started on the exercycle and other exercises. I started running. My goal was to run over 1,000 miles a year (only 2.75 a day). We have kept it up over the last four years and this is our 5th year. To see all my documented runs-walks, well over 200 of them, with interactive maps, videos and pictures, click here.

Since my knees blew out almost two years ago I’ve had the challenge of how to keep it up without running. We bought an elliptical machine for our simple home gym (next to Janet’s exercycle) and put in a wide screen TV.

When we are home we work together and watch old movies, documentaries, religious DVDs and more. (We pulled the plug on cable and TV eight years ago. We love Netflix.)

When we are away from home (2/3rds of the time) we still keep it up. I take off each day for power walks, which my knees can take, or I use the equipment in the hotels.

I love exploring on my feet. In the last five years, by the grace of God, I’ve been blessed to run-walk through many countries including Israel, Italy, Australia, Philippines, India, England, Ireland, Dubai, Oman, Poland, Turkey, Greece, and all the other places we visited because of conferences or pilgrimages. The best way to understand the land is to walk-run it. (You can see documentaries of all my runs here.)

This is our 5th year and I just passed the 500 mile milestone, 92.54 miles ahead of my goal for this date. 

But it is still way to easy to eat and drink too much. I have a motto “Nothing tastes as good as thin feels.” Though it is my motto, it is not always easy to remember and obey. 

The Catechism reminds me daily about Gluttony and Sloth and I must fight them. We usually think of sin in terms of sex, murder, abortion, gossip, lying or stealing–but the Catechism lists Gluttony and Sloth right up there with the others–each listed as one of the seven capital sins. 

Sloth is a “culpable lack of physical or spiritual effort; acedia or laziness.” Gluttony is an “overindulgence in food or drink.”

God only gave us one body and one lifetime. How are we going to use the gifts of God? Are we ready to give an account? Yikes, I better get back to work :-) What about you??

Earlier Posts: Updated Super Foods Chart & Fitness, and Who is That Fat Man (Me!)?