1 – Fr. Don Calloway in Medjugorje
Many know about the wonderful conversion of Don Calloway
from delinquency to priesthood (see PS 1). He is now posted
in Steubenville, as the vocations director for his community,
Marians of the Immaculate Conception. At the beginning
of June, Fr. Don was visiting Medjugorje.
Sr. Em: When you go on mission, how do you find
the people of God today?
Fr. Don: Everywhere I see that the family is very much under attack and many people are indifferent to the Faith. I can’t even imagine what is happening in the heart of Our Lady, seeing the young generation growing up knowing almost nothing about the faith.
In my travelling and speaking, I assume that nobody knows
anything about the faith. I start from the basics, lay the
foundation and then build on that. So many of them are not
getting this from their parish. Some of the convents I have
been to are so New Age, feminist, ecological, more concerned
with trees or whatever. It is unbelievable. I got kicked
out of a Catholic High school in the Carribean because they
were promoting contraception and I was preaching against
it.
I think that in many ways the people who need the message
of Medjugorje the most are the priests, because often the
way that they are preaching is not communicating the solid
stuff. The people are just like sheep without a shepherd.
They don’t know where to go so they are going to anyone
who is calling out to them. It is bad in the parishes, in
the schools, the Catholic universities, in the diocese, in
the chancelleries, etc. The smoke of Satan has crept in to
so many areas.
SE: Do you mean that Our Lady failed in Medjugorje?
After 25 years we should see the world be converted and
be reconciled. Such was the plan she expressed from the
very beginning. Has this plan failed?
FD: I think we have failed her; we have ignored her requests. She is saying ‘I need your prayers, I need your sacrifices.’ Fasting is an example. Yes, it is difficult, but it seems that we reject this part of the message. Then we have wars and all kinds of problems in the family, the diocese, convents, parishes, and still nobody is fasting, or so few. I think that the influence of the world is so strong that the sacrificial element of living the Gospel is too difficult for most people. We want instant. Everything has to be now.
I think we are failing Our Lady in a certain sense. I think
that we are trying to come up with our own ways to make things
better, but they are human ways. They are not ways of sacrifice.
The Mother of the Prophets is ignored. The world hates prophets
and tries to silence them. You can almost see Our Lady, the
Mother of Prophets, crying. It is the same for the priests.
When the priests want to preach the Gospel powerfully, almost
immediately they are taken away from their parish and put
out in the country where they have a parish of ten people.
The persecution is great.
The evil is strong. I think that
Jesus and Mary are looking for victim souls. They want victim
souls, people who continue the sacrifice of Christ for the
world. There are so few people who offer themselves for this.
SE: Have you found places which give you hope for
the future?
FD: Actually yes, within the belly of the beast so to speak. In the United States there is a new generation of priests coming ! They are zealous, they are on fire, many of them have had some kind of conversion experience. Most of them have struggled with something, but through John Paul II, through a World Youth Day, through a Marian apparition, they come back to the faith and live an intimate relationship with Jesus and Mary. Now the seminaries in the US are being filled up with these zealous men. There is a whole new generation coming in, what I call the John Paul II Generation. They were formed by that holy man and now they are going to be the ones who are taking the lead. I think Our Lady is secretly forming this army that the world can’t see, and if the world could see it they would hate it. At some point, they are going to be the ones to lead the charge for the battle.
SE : Father, your community is very involved in
the Divine Mercy as revealed to Sr. Faustina. Can you explain
how Medjugorje is connected with Divine Mercy ?
FD : Divine Mercy and the events of Medjugorje both really came upon the scene about the same time. You can think about Faustina whose work began in the 30s but was banned for many years. Only with the Pontificate of John Paul II did it become approved, and then it started strong and went everywhere. In the same way, at the beginning of the Pontificate of JP II, Medjugorje starts.
These realities are, in my opinion, the two crucial elements
of the New Evangelization. You have to tell the people things
that will shake them up. This takes a revelation, something
out of the ordinary. Medjugorje and the Divine Mercy is the ‘one-two
punch’ for the spiritual life today! That is basically
what I tell people: The Rosary and the Chaplet of Mercy.
God is offering us these things from heaven.
SE : The merciful Christ speaks of a time of mercy
and the Queen of Peace speaks of a time of grace. These
two words, mercy and grace, have the same root in Croatian!
FD : The Holy Spirit is definitely doing something through the New Evengelization. The whole world is ready to be re-evangelized. When you want to make something grow in the field, you put manure on it. Within the last fifty years that is what has happened in the Church: it has been stinky, it has been a mess. But when the new springtime comes it will be beautiful!
SE : Our Lady is gathering a people willing to
be dedicated to her, just like the Lord, Who changed the
world with twelve men. This He can do again ! Fruitfulness
does not depend upon numbers but on holiness. Then there
is hope.
FD : Exactly! As the vocations director for our community (MIC), I see that we are getting good vocations. They are part of the new generation. They want orthodoxy, they want faithfulness, they are open to Medjugorje, because they have seen the fruit. God is at work, we just have to wait and trust.
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Is your child a drug addict? A criminal?
Fallen away from the Faith? Do you pray and worry daily for your
child? Read the story of an addict who turned away from the diabolism
of drugs through an amazing conversion because of Mary and turned to
God. Then became a priest.
"An inspiring story of a truly amazing conversion. You will be thrilled to read how our Lord redirected this man's passion from a life of crime to a love for Jesus and Mary, and for surfing! If Hollywood had faith the size of a mustard seed, Father Calloway's story would be in the movies already. It's a page-turner, moving from a delinquent youth to an adult faith –- and then on to the priesthood. It's a dramatic life, and Father Calloway tells it all with a compelling and manly literary voice. So if it's not a movie (yet), you may remember it as one. It's that vivid."
-- Scott Hahn, Ph.D.
Professor of Theology and Scripture
Franciscan University of Steubenville
"This is an amazing, captivating story, because The Divine Mercy is an amazing and captivating reality. The power of Jesus and Mary move through this story like the power of a ten foot Pacific wave. Read this book and watch the same wave lift Donald Calloway that lifted Paul and Augustine, Francis and Ignatius, from 'incorrigible' and 'impossible' to 'radically converted.' It’s the old, old story and it’s irresistibly new every time. Here, it’s told with winsome candor and simplicity by an ex-druggie, ex-criminal surfer-priest."
-- Peter Kreeft, Ph.D.
Author – I Surf, Therefore I Am: A Philosophy of Surfing