Reaching Our Fallen-Away Children
Volume XXV, Number 11 – June 29, 2021
Dear CatholiCity Citizen,
Howdy! I have great news that I can barely wait to share with you, plus our always-popular quotations, and a true prayer of faith we can pray together.
For years you have been telling me you're worried about the salvation of your fallen-away children and grandchildren. This has got to be the top intention you've submitted for our many Masses and pilgrimages.
What you are about to read is going to give you real hope for reaching our fallen-away generation.
It is going to work. Even better, it's already begun!
Reaching Your Lost ChildrenTo understand how to reach our fallen-away children, we need to consider how we have already influenced many millions of souls, in small and large ways, without any traditional marketing or worldly influence.
Starting in Cleveland in 1991, we gave a free Catholic talk to one person. That person gave it to another. Until someone reached you. By God's grace, you joined hundreds of thousands influencing one person at a time with one book, medal, CD, booklet or scapular. You touched your friends and relatives, all over the world, who no one else could reach.
This "How" is profoundly simple. It requires patience and sacrifice. Which leads us to how we are going to reach our fallen-away children.
Defining the Problem: A Lost GenerationWe all know that a huge portion of college and young adults (tragically, including those raised Catholic) live the most functionally-atheist lifestyles in American history because they were immersed within a virulently anti-Christian culture. Many are profoundly anti-religious.
I long for these souls! And I cannot express in words how important it is to reach them right away, before they fall into more ruin and unhappiness while their hearts harden against Christ, the sacramental life, and their own destinies within God's will.
Our hearts break as we watch so many reject the Church, seemingly forever. To compound this tragedy, our devout Catholic children are now having trouble finding truly good friends (and spouses) who are practicing believers.
This is a cross most of us carry.
Going Out for the Lost SheepWe are out of time. This generation was not given the good Catholic life we were given, and now we need to go out into the world, find them, and present it to them.
And that is exactly what our new initiative is going to do. We are going to bring back the lost sheep, one person at a time.
It is an answer to your prayers, as you will see.
Friendship: The Ultimate Tool for EvangelizationInstead of designing yet another social media initiative that the lost generation will never find or reject outright, we believe we have found a better way.
This time, the Mary Foundation's "tool for evangelization" is friendship itself. This begins next month.
Hundreds Turn into Thousands
One person and one friendship at a time, and before the end of this year, hundreds of devout twenty-somethings will bring hundreds of their friends and relatives into the fold.
Those hundreds could grow into thousands. (In fact, there are roughly 150,000 baptized Catholics between the ages of 18 to 29 in the Cleveland metro area alone). Over 10,000 still attend Sunday Mass. Many are already "on fire" for the true faith.
These young apostles will set the rest of the practicing 10,000 on fire so we can go get the hundreds of thousands of Catholic and non-Catholic twenty-somethings all across Cleveland.
"Organic" Catholic Groups are FormingFor example, here in the Cleveland area there is an "organic" Catholic group with over a hundred participants started by two young men; they call themselves Catching Fire.
Another is called "Grapevine." It meets weekly at a local Catholic Church and is growing fast.
There are thousands of groups throughout the U.S. and Canada, and we will help them grow via ever-expanding networks of friendships. New such groups will form as a result of inspiring and guiding new young leaders.
As we expand across America, we increase the opportunity for your children and grandchildren to "be invited" to the gatherings, groups, and events through authentic, sacramental Catholic friendship.
Isn't that something you would want to help create through your prayers and financial sacrifice?
All along the way, we give these young adults free "tools for evangelization" provided by the Mary Foundation, to enlighten their hearts to the Truth in proven, effective ways (just as many of you found your way back through my novels, for example, when you were younger).
If you help us, it will happen.
Marriages, Children, VocationsYoung men will meet young women. Future dads will meet future moms. Good Catholic marriages will come into being over the next few years. Children will be born. Vocations will increase. Parishes will be regenerated. A lost generation will be found!
As we expand, Our Lady will send us devout Catholic young adults to run the day-to-day planning and administration. We will hire the most zealous and talented among them, recruit leaders and volunteers, and give them professional training and executive responsibility.
This crucial aspect--empowering young Catholic leaders--has already begun. My son, Xavier (23, right) and his friend Anthony (23, left), conceived, designed, and planned just about everything. They know their own peers. They are inviting not only their extensive network of devout friends, but are also inviting the dynamic young priests who will attend.
While praying about this to Our Lady, the words "build the army" came into my mind. It gave me chills. I believe Mary will send her spouse, the Holy Spirit, to inspire everyone involved. This will be a big part of the Great Awakening we all prayed for last year!
New Tools for EvangelizationAlong the way, we will humbly learn from these fallen-away souls as they are invited into our friendships. Soon the Mary Foundation and Catholicity.com will release new tools for evangelization (such as our powerful Warning book and our brand-new Brown Scapular) designed to help you reach your children and grandchildren now.
Human nature doesn't change. And grace builds upon nature. The lost generation craves meaningful friendships in the real world.
How to Pay for It All? Ha!In a real way, our Cleveland area "beta test" is a gift you have already sacrificed to provide during our annual Lenten Appeal in March.
"God owns all the silver and all the gold," as our first spiritual director, Father Bill Witt (RIP), used to assure me, so we will pray the money in. This way, God retains the veto power.
Xavier and Anthony Are ReadyThat is how we are going to go out and bring your fallen-away children and grandchildren back into the flock.
The Mary Foundation began in Cleveland in 1991 and has touched millions, one person at a time, all over the world. In 2021, we're going to do it again!
Let's get to the quotations, and then let's pray for that money to come in.
Quotations
"Suppose one of you has a hundred sheep and loses one of them. Doesn’t he leave the ninety-nine in the open country and go after the lost sheep until he finds it? And when he finds it, he joyfully puts it on his shoulders and goes home. Then he calls his friends and neighbors together and says, ‘Rejoice with me; I have found my lost sheep.’"
-Jesus
"Be who God meant you to be and you will set the world on fire."
-Saint Catherine of Sienna
"I am an old man. However, when I was a young man, I became a believing, zealous, practicing Catholic because, and almost solely because, Catholics sought me out, befriended me, taught me the True Faith, put up with me, and loved me at a time when the institutional Church didn't seem to give a damn."
- Joseph Wood
"Eating and drinking don't make friendships - such friendship even robbers and murderers have. But if we are friends, if we truly care for one another, let us help one another spiritually. . . Let us hinder those things that lead our friends away to hell."
- Saint John Chrysostom
"You are the light of the world! See to it that the people are edified by your example, by the purity of your lives, by the moderation of your conduct, and the brilliance of your holiness!"
- Pope Saint Pius V
"Whenever we wish to win someone over and engage him in the greater service of God our Lord... we may lead others to good by praying or agreeing with them on a certain good point, leaving aside whatever else may be wrong. Thus, after gaining his confidence, we shall meet with better success. In this sense we enter his door with him, but we come out our own."
- Saint Ignatius of Loyola
Tens of thousands of us together, please join me in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit...
O Heavenly Father, from Whom nothing can ever be hidden,
we humbly beg You to gaze into our broken hearts,
which ache for the salvation of our children, grandchildren,
great grandchildren, nieces, and nephews.
How many times have we asked you for the graces needed
so that the lost among them may come back into the fold?
How many times have we implored the Sorrowful Heart of Mary
to intercede for their conversion?
We shall never cease because Your Son taught us to ask,
and promised that we shall receive.
We know that you will not give us a stone
when we ask for bread!
For the sake of the salvation of their souls,
for the sake of their future lives here on earth,
for the sake of their future spouses and children,
hear our pleas, O Father!
Cast open the bright shining windows of heaven
and from them pour forth in torrents
the financial means needed so this initiative
may succeed and expand throughout America without delay.
Overwhelm us, Father, with Your Infinite Generosity.
We offer our gratitude in advance.
We love you! We need you!
Our children need you!
We accept anything and everything and all things
your Holy Will provides,
so they may love you,
so Your Kingdom may come! Amen.
And Amen. Thank you for being a part of it all.
A Beautiful Gift ReturnsBy popular demand, our stunning Benedictine Icon wall crucifix is back! There is a room in your home, or the home of someone you love, for this heaven-touched gift (with the added bonus of knowing you are modestly supporting our work financially).
The Hair FiascoThe vote is in. The polls are closed. You all loathed my long hair, except for one person. So, uh, enjoy your 4th of July weekend. God bless America!
With Saint Therese of Lisieux,
Bud Macfarlane
Founder
