 Hey, welcome everybody Steve back again with fire Anthony. Thank you fire for being here. Yeah, thank you Yeah, we were talking last week about doing a little show on the miraculous metal since he piqued my interest again during a Colby Consecration lecture series he did when he talks about this conversion of Alphonse Radisburn And he also mentioned another guy we may get into later, but we're gonna focus on this first off Fryer, what is the miraculous metal? What did St. Colby think about it? And why is it so powerful? the miraculous metal It came it came from the apparition that happened in Rueda Bach from St. Catherine La Verre so St. Catherine La Verre now the dates are very important this happened in 1830 in 1830 there were three apparitions that happened the St. Catherine in the second apparition The first one's very it's a very sweet apparition because you know She gets led there by this little this little angel or something and our lady sitting actually sitting there in a chair You can hear her her gown ruffling and St. Catherine just goes up kneels there and puts her hands on our lady's lap It's a very beautiful very very sweet apparition that took place then in the second one our lady appears above the altar and There's a she's standing on the globe And that globe is encircled by the serpent and her foot her immaculate foot is crushing the head of the serpent Which is the film the film into the prophecy of Genesis 315 and Then her hands are extended towards the earth and there are rays coming Down as though out of her hands, but really from rings that are on her fingers And there are those rays are coming down to the earth and they're widening as they come towards the earth and Then there's a Then later she sees coming around our lady. It's the words. Oh Mary conceived without sin and then on the back of the image you have I've got a big miraculous metal here You probably can't see it from the globe and we cross and there's the M with the bar going across And so it shows the m's for our lady and the crosses for our Lord the redemption There's a bar that connects them and inner weaves our lady always in the mystery of redemption And the mission of redemption of our Lord and so just below that you have the two hearts of the sacred heart And that's encircled in with the crown of thorns for the suffering that our Lord endured and then you get the immaculate heart right next to our Lord With a sword Plunged into her heart from the city of Simeon that from all the sorrows of our lady Being that she she she assisted and participated in in this redemption as it was prophesied in In Genesis 3 15 our lady promised in that apparition That anyone who would wear that metal will first told St. Catherine to have it struck but that anyone who would wear that metal a blessed metal and Wear it around their neck would receive many graces now Of course these were the graces that were symbolized from the rays of light that were coming from her rings now there were a couple of rings that didn't have any light that was emitting from them and St. Catherine asked about those and the response was those are all the graces that men do not ask me for Which is a very interesting thing that means we asked our lady is the meat mediators of all graces She she gives all graces. God does not grant grace except through the Blessed Virgin Mary That's a fact in the church. It's just not dogmatically established You read the fathers of the church you read the saints Everyone is almost always believed this All graces come through our lady The goddess goes so far to think that in some capacity these graces belong to our lady now They're all the graces that are merited by our Lord on the cross. So they're his graces But and this is it gets complicated I know we're not talking about this because we could go on for another hour about our lady spouse the Holy Spirit Why it is that she receives these graces? but in a way in same same X-men Colby talks about this but really piggybacking on St. Louis to Monford about The fact that our lady her immaculate heart is the external manifestation Of the Holy Ghost some magnificent thing to say what it means is the Holy Ghost He's the center and he's the soul that is of the church that he's he's the love of the Holy Trinity and The love is what you're responsible for the sanctification And that's what our Lord meant when he said I will send you know You want me to go to the father being so I was in the Paraclete Well, the Holy Ghost doesn't do anything except for through the his holy spouse He wants to manifest his goodness all through her. She's the external manifestation in that sense of the Holy Spirit So these graces as blessed John Don Skotis talks about in some capacity They are hers to distribute as she likes now. We got to remember there a lady only does God's will She's a perfectly conformed to God. She could never do anything But God's will anything but God's will would seem to her the most putrid of Things you could imagine so only God's will that that that is the only thing that would make sense to her so God gives her these graces meaning these graces that when they're needed especially like Accidental graces or transitory graces. He goes so far to say that you know, I think this is speculation But that they're created in her will They're created in because they have to be created somewhere But they're created in the Immaculate Virgin and so she dispenses them as as she sees fit That is a core perfectly according to the will of God because that's what the Blessed Virgin Mary. That's what she does So that you have these graces and so we ask her for these graces and those graces come down in that way and This is an instrument. So why the miraculous metal the miraculous metal because our Lady wants that she wants some means she wants to say here is a tool. Here's an instrument By which I want to communicate the graces that are given me to give to you It's just another way of of trying to help us to receive those graces. It's a mother's attention to us as she she's always trying to prepare us and Bring us closer to her son and provide for us the redeeming grace that our Lord won for us on the cross Because we squander that stuff, but a mother doesn't want as if she sat there and suffered that it's in that moment of suffering at the foot of the cross where we become her children that is in in in Revelation 12 when it talks about and she brought forth the man child in pain in in Intrigulation right, but that's us. That wasn't our Lord. That was us that she she suffered pain with So the miraculous metal is an instrument. It's an instrument by which our lady Grants us graces for those who wear a blessed metal around their neck faithfully, right? Well, that happened at 18 That happened in 1830 already by 1832 It had been struck and they started to give these out to people But I think it was 1832 that an epidemic hit in France, especially Paris at about 20,000 people died Well, they immediately distributed 2,000 metals And they were able to see right away all kinds of miracles started to happen people started to get cured and The epidemic started to subside This is a cholera epidemic It was the people at France that started to refer to this metal the metal of the immaculate conception That's what the metal is its official name is the metal the immaculate conception even though the Roman ritual It says mentally immaculate conception or by common usage the miraculous metal is what And so it was in Paris what they started to refer to it as the miraculous metal now in in in Rome Around this time, especially at the time of Alphonse Raddisfon, which was in 1841 is Really it was 1842 Very beginning of 1842 when Alphonse Raddisfon makes it to to the city of Rome During that time. There's already a bunch of French Exiles basically that are living there because you remember all the all the Other revolutions that were taking place and Catholics were displaced especially anybody that was of Kind of nobility or in the government. They they had to flee there were big Catholics They had to flee and Rome at that point time was still was still run by the Pope The Pope still had all the papal states and that means he was the king of that area But he was very open to allowing to any of the this was Pope Pope Pius the 9th blessed Pope Pius the 9th very Holy and a very very great He was a long-ish reigning pontiff and probably one of the most holiest. He was a very holy man It's a shame. He's not a saint yet, but there's other reasons for that. I'm not gonna go into them So during that time Alphonse was on a journey, right? Well, I'll just finish the thought there. So this is why you have the miraculous metal there You've got Frenchmen who have already seen the power of it there in France but already within five years of It's of its being struck already 10 million had been distributed and by 16 I think it was like 76 or something whenever St. Kathleen library died already a billion that metals had been given out. That's a lot. I mean for the 1800s That's a lot to strike that many metals and to hand them all out a billion metals that already been distributed It's a very popular metal Of our lady macron conception. I remember this is also before It's normal for us to think yeah a macron conception. I mean we're all on board. Well, it hadn't been defined yet It wasn't defined until 1854. So this was in the 1830s well before The man the American conception became just a common thing even today I had one catechist when I was I went down to talk about our lady to a group of a The group of kids at the local parish here as a CCD class or something and You know, you know, the kids are at the local CCD classes They really don't know a whole lot in order the teachers but they asked me to come down talk about our lady So I started to talk about our lady. I realized nobody knew anything But one of the teachers piped up and said when I asked so do you know what the immaculate conception is a teacher said Yeah, that's when that's what our lady gave birth to Jesus and I looked at the teacher said no That's like what I'm supposed to say So for three That's right. So so it you know, even today we don't we don't know a whole lot about it At least a lot of Catholics don't so back then before was even defined How many people talked about how many lay people were around talking about the macron conception? But I think lay people had always known it. It really came from the people the church had always known She was immaculate So that's where we get these Frenchmen there it it roamed with with these bells now Alphonse being you and franciscan you guys been Celebrating that long before the definition, right? The immaculate conception really St. St. Francis himself. There's a couple of different things st. Francis himself First he gave us this prayer Abidomina and we say it every morning at breakfast when we finish our meal It's a beautiful little prayer, but it just talks about it's a prayer that It just talks about the real the great dignity of our lady and then even st. Francis in his own lifetime when it was in rietti I can't remember but he was in like northern kind of northeastern Italy Preach and there he raised money. He begged money To build a church and in that church he built an altar dedicated to the immaculate conception of st. Francis The building he he built an altar dedicated to the immaculate conception So it's very much a part of the franciscan this comes down through We refer to it as the franciscan dogma because it was it was the franciscans who fought tooth and nail and never once They had never we had never not believed our lady was immaculate conceived the big war between war it was a A debate between the franciscans and the dominicans all the way up until the dogmatic pronouncement they say The the dominicans god bless them I mean following the line of thought from from thomas because thomas did not believe our lady was immaculate conceived He worked it out based on based on the science and the Theology basically of Aristotle or the philosophy of Aristotle and so is it just a different way to approach it? And so it was wrong But blessed john dunscottis was able to arrive at a way where he could he easily proved it was it was It was obvious that our lady was conceived without sin So that that debate came all the way down to right before the pronouncement 1854 where the dominicans had an all night vigil Praying that the pope wouldn't make this mistake So thankfully he made the mistake and he he defended the fate so Um, so yes, it comes down from the franciscan school Of thought i mean that's where you get the poor clarinus that were conceptionists Mary of a grade up conceptionists none they they believed the immaculate conception And I could go on and on but we're talking about alphons, right? So who is this alphons guy? Who was this alphons guy so alphons rat alphons ratis bond was an atheist jew Now forgive me anybody who's going to watch this and think i'm being rude by saying jew But being a jew means you're part of a nation that that's what they're they're jewish So it's not in any way to say anything bad about him. Our lord was a jew Our lady was a jew. This isn't we're not being uh, we're not we're not being Description it's a word you use for a a people with a certain nationality. They were of a bloodline And they still are today. Well Alphons was an atheist jew He he didn't I mean he liked the cultural aspect of it and the nationalistic You know they they identified with it, but he didn't believe anything. He was an enlightened Especially that time period it comes down to us today, especially the progressive side of things the liberal that kind of the liberal people It's all about You know we It's we don't bind to superstition. That's what kind of this illuminated mindset is Alphons was that way it came from a really good family The strawsbergs the strawsbergs are one of those financial families Very wealthy very influential His life was made he was 28 years old and he was espoused to his niece that sounds gross to us But back then I guess I don't know but he was espoused to his niece But she was not of marrying age yet and so in waiting to espouse his beloved niece and Start his life in this job with his uncle in you know, uh, this very wealthy business that they had his life was set But he was going to spend a year just waiting so he could espouse his his bride And so he went on a long journey. It's going to be a whole year And first and so he found himself at the end of On kind of around the end of 1841 He found himself in Palermo and he was getting ready to take off to go to Sicily And then he was going to go to Malta and then he was going to head off to uh Constantinople and that was going to make up the rest of his year The city going beaches and just kind of living the high life But as he was in Palermo that's down in Naples. He got this he got this This longing to go to Rome. He thought well, I'm here now And once I go back and get married and start my work. I'll never come back here again. I know it So I better go visit Rome. So he got a ticket and he went for a fortnight So for 14 days two weeks He went to Rome and just went around to visit all the churches looked at all the artwork went to the museums And just tried to cram a bunch of stuff in his head, you know On the very last night of his trip there in Italy when he had to head back to Palermo in Naples To where he's going to get on a boat. I guess and start heading over to Sicily uh Heading east as he says He wanted to call on an old friend now here. I'm going to give you a couple names So he was going to call on a friend named, uh, Gustav Gustav Bassier now I'm most likely getting the names wrong because I I don't know how to say these names in french I mean, these are french names and they've got these endings I'm sure you're not supposed to say but I have no clue how to say them So somebody's gonna be watching this say you don't say it. Well, I don't have to say So I'm just going to say it a certain way and I'll try to be consistent So we know kind of who the characters are So Gustav was the brother and he was Gustav was a good friend of his but he was a Protestant. He was in I don't know some kind of Protestantism and these two would get in they were school friends They would get in debates and their debates would get pretty heated and they would end with calling each other names Uh, the Protestant would call him a callous Jew and he would call his friend a fanatic Protestant and then they would leave and but they were still friends Well, he was at Rome somehow And so Alfons went to pay him a visit the night before he's going to leave. He didn't find him at home So he went to his brother's house Gustav had his brother Theodore Boussier Who lived nearby I guess And he went just to leave a note for that family because he had met Gustav's brother Theodore Before but they didn't they weren't friends. I really didn't know each other More than just having a conversation Went to the house knocked the door the italian the italian servant lady came And he wanted to leave a note with her but she didn't understand So she ushered him in to the drawing room as they say and that's where the family was all Seated and enjoying their saturday afternoon or saturday evening And this greatly irritated Alfons because he didn't want to sit down talk to this family because they were catholic And he had a deep hatred for catholics Alfons did 15 years earlier Alfons brother had converted to the faith And became a catholic priest And that really that was and Alfons persecuted him for it He hated him outright for it wouldn't speak to him and he first he says in his own words. I persecuted him for it So he sat down you remember Alfons is a he's a sophisticated man He's from a cultured family and he sits down and him and Theodore Boussierre with his family president They exchange civil pleasantries And they they just kind of talk about things that are on a pretty superficial Level until Theodore who's a good catholic. He's actually he was actually a uh convert from Protestantism He starts digging in a little bit more looking for you know how good catholics They they get tired of talking about this petty stuff. So they want to dig a little bit more you're at rome What else have you seen? What else did you do? so Alfons He mentions well when I was at Archeri At Archeri's it's actually a franciscan church. It's an ancient I mean the franciscans already had that church. I think in the during the life of st. Francis But it's on the capitoline hills where the capital is used to be a papal building Papal palace, but they took it Now they have you know, so anyways, it's it's a church. It's way up on top of this hill Really old church lots of saints buried there to it's a magnificent place when he was in there Uh, he said this I have a quote and I'll read it to you a rather odd thing happened to me While I was looking over the church. I felt myself suddenly seized with an emotion for which I could assign no cause The ballet they placed I guess just the you know, the usher whoever was there to take care of the door Seeing my agitation asked me What was the matter and whether I would go out into the open air Adding that he had often seen strange similar Similarly a stranger similarly affected very interesting. Now this this Archeri. It's a church dedicated to our lady And when he was in there he just he'd visit all kinds of churches when he was in this church dedicated to our lady He got very emotional and he didn't know what to do about it now hearing that the good friend This is theodore He kind of has a spark on his eye. This is the way he writes He says he has a spark on his eye and so alphonse notices it but Theodore thinks in at this moment. He's going to be a catholic He will be a catholic and alphonse thinking this is what he's probably thinking starts to scoff at it Now alphonse was a scoffer. He was one of those scoffers they talked about in scripture And so he scoffed at the whole idea and said I was born a Jew and I will die a Jew And then later he says he went went down he walked through the the jewish ghetto and it just confirmed his hatred for the faith and everything else so at that With this 28 year old Strasburg young man who's there who knows everything and is sure of everything Completely sure of himself theodore proposes a challenge to him And he says if I offer you something and ask you to wear it because you're so sure of yourself will you wear it And so alphonse starts to scoff again. It's just what is this thing? You know, what is it? Let me see this thing you want me to wear and He shows him the medal of the blessed virgin Mary so the miraculous medal and he hands it to him and alphonse scoffs and just says what and so the Theodore says well if you're so sure of yourself It's nothing for you. It's just a medal. It's a trinket Just wear it and it'll make it'll please me greatly if you would wear this. Please just just wear it And so he says fine. I'll I will take your challenge. I will wear your I will wear your your silly little medal or whatever And then the good friend this is a this is a lesson to us that we we should push sometimes because we don't push we We bow down to human respect. We hear theodore. He goes a bit further and he says And could I ask you also to say this prayer? And he gives him the prayer of the memorandum and he you know, oh, Mary can see without sin pray for us They're every course to thee And he says oh, I mean this is too much you're asking me to say this prayer to him Well, it's nothing for you the prayer It would mean a lot to me The prayer doesn't mean anything to you wear the medal say the prayer is like fine I'll say your prayer and could you also write it down because it's my only copy and and he's like Oh, you're unbearable. You just don't even know where to stop He's like fine. I will write it down But you I will keep your copy and you will take my copy. So that's how he makes off with it And he leaves there mumbling like these impossible people sometimes that's So they get anyways that said he he leaves and that's Saturday night Sunday night, right? This is the first night. They said That was the first night they met now Alphonse is supposed to leave sat sunday evening So this is the night before he's supposed to leave And theodore goes and pays a visit to him wherever his house his apartment was and leaves a little noticing Would you please meet me tomorrow at 10 o'clock? And he does Alphonse comes and he meets him promptly at 10 o'clock on sunday morning And um, they talk again and go visit a couple of places or scoffing and whatever else had no impact But theodore's being pretty open now saying that I will have you will you know, you you will convert to the faith And Alphonse is laughing at him saying that wouldn't happen But here's where the theodore the good friend goes even further He says You you have to stay You can't get on you can't get on that You can't get on the coach and go back to play and you have to stay here and Alphonse absolutely not He's like i'm going to be on the on the beaches of multa I'm not staying here another day And he's like no, I absolutely insist I will not let you go and he kind of takes him To the station and somehow gets Alphonse to change his ticket I don't know if it was a week later two weeks later, but it changes his ticket And so he Alphonse Follows suit and changes the ticket So that ends that evening and that Saturday or sunday evening now theodore has to go have dinner with somebody He's he parts ways with Alphonse Now theodore Boussier goes and has dinner with a good friend now the friend's name, which i'm sure i'm not saying it Right is uh day la freon and he He was a count and he worked in the government when he was in france And he was older, but a very great piety. They said he was a good catholic Well, they had a long discussion about Alphonse and la freon Offered and said that he would pray much for Alphonse rattlespawn By monday night la freon was already dead He had already died, okay So a couple days go by and every day now this good friend la freon. He's dead Boussier, um, sorry Theodore Boussier is good friends with him. It's like a family member who just died now. He split between Seeking the conversion of Alphonse which he had this internal Impulse that he had to keep pursuing him like a hound He had to they talked about our lord as the hound of heaven He just had to constantly be tracking down this atheist jewish young man to try to get him to convert Um, and then he also felt he had these duties these obligations because his friend his good dear friendages died And he wanted to be there to pray and he wanted to console. He wanted to mourn himself But he wanted to console the family But even the priest that was there said you need to go after this young man So keep going keep doing your work do what you feel god's calling you to do So he would go track down Alphonse rattlespawn and they would keep uh, he'd keep taking him around town Well, Wednesday, I'll just jump to Wednesday because they met Tuesday and then on Wednesday They meet again and each day Alphonse is scoffing and he's saying he's blaspheming and he's mocking the faith and everything else Which you can imagine it's hard on somebody because when we hear somebody scoffing and blaspheming We want to shun them right away But we have to also know where people are at and so he's not a catholic He's doing this as someone who hates the faith and so a good catholic was there giving good catholic example and trying to Help him see the faith So he didn't abandon him in that well on Wednesday, they go to visit a couple of places and one of those places was San San Stefano Rotondo, I don't know if you've ever been there, but it's a it's a church. It's also up on one of the hills It's on kind of the older part of Rome It's close to where the house where st. Gregor the great used to live and some other real famous churches But it's more wooded up in that area and things like that That's kind of south of the the Coliseum and so They go to San Stefano Rotondo and it's a church Rotondo's because it's in a circle right and all the walls going all the way around the church Are very graphic depictions of martyr of the great famous martyrdoms that happened at Rome And he takes alphonse there and alphonse is pretty impressed with this He thought it was gruesome and terrible all these terrible ways that these Christians had died But in the end justified it by saying yeah, but the Jews have suffered a lot at the hands of the Christians He left it that so they left there and they went to they walked up the hill And that leads you to st St. John ladder and so it took him to st. John ladder the principal church of the of our holy faith And in there if anybody's been there, you see there's all the statues going down the main nave And those are all the all the apostles And each of those statues is holding the instrument of his death Like you got st. Bartholomew is holding his own skin because he was flayed alive and Over top of his arm. It's pretty interesting statue and these are huge statues But above those statues are these reliefs these base reliefs that depict on one side the gospel side Fulfillments of prophecy from the old testament What happened in the in the new testament and then on the the epistle side You have the the fulfillment of those new testament Fulfillments, I'm sorry the the the figures of those new testament fulfillments and they come down You know going across the aisle so you can look across and see That's what that's what happened the flood happened. This is what happened Uh the fulfillment and the faith crucifixion is what happened. So you see these things in the church It's very apologetic. It's it's very catechetical And so he took them there and alphonse was pretty interested. He thought that was pretty interesting Now this is some of you's never been it was later attested to that He never read more than two pages of the whole bible now his brother said that about So from there they're walking out of st. John ladder and right across the street from st John ladder is the scala santa. That's the holy stairs Where there are lord climbed up where Pontius Pilate was the st. Helena brought back from Jerusalem They stopped right in front of the holy stairs And this is where the brother I have a quote to see like find the quote real quick. So I'm not not the brother but theodore Theodore stops there and he just says Hail scala santa Hail holy stairs Here is a man who will one day ascend you on his knees because there was this there's this rivalry going I wouldn't say it's holy But it was a rivalry because it was holy on the part of theodore busier because he was he's challenging openly this guy saying you will become catholic And then you got the the the atheist jew there saying this is nonsense You know, this is absolute nonsense that only superstitious, you know, old ladies do this kind of stuff And here's the prophecy the very so that's that's Wednesday Probably late afternoon The next morning Alphonse goes to piazza spania. That's where the The spanish stairs are that's where that column is with the beautiful statue the maccha conception the pope goes to every year at the time of The maccha conception and leaves flowers and gives a little talk and things like that's a beautiful thing Well, there's a lot of cafes there and whatever so that morning thursday morning Alphonse goes to some different cafes and gets he's reading the paper He's he's engaging in conversation We have the testimony from the people who he met with in those mornings and the frivolous Non-essential things that they were talking about And theodore makes an interesting point in the book. He said if anybody would have said to him In two hours, you will be a devout catholic He would have just scoffed at it because he was blaspheming all the way up. Well close to uh, you know, it's just You take one of the roads it a diagonal from piazza spania and you find yourself There's a little church tucked in a corner there. It's on the corner of two streets And it's called san andre de le fratti de le frate and it's a church run by the minimums of st. francis paula A church is of no significance. It really doesn't have anything in it. That's really worth seeing It's got a couple of statues that were carved by um Bernini That didn't make the cut for whatever he was doing something for and they're in there in the church But there's no reason really to visit the church unless you're just walking by and you say hey, what's in there? so they met He's walking over towards the church and he runs into theodore boussier and That was a church where mr. Let la ferron la ferron Was in the sacristy repose and they were going to have the funeral the next day or something like that and so Theodore boussier had to go in there and do some arrangements for The the funeral take about 10 minutes in the meantime alphondratus bond is just kind of walking around the church It's a small church. It's not very large And he was on the epistle side So that means he's on the right side of the church just looking at some things and he says he remembers a dog He doesn't remember anything. He doesn't remember anybody else being there, but he remembers some dog jumping around him and next thing you know He's on the complete other side of the church the nave on now He's on the gospel side of the church, which is on the left side and he's before an altar And on this altar, there's a magnificent light coming from this altar And on that altar, which it's an altar of st. Michael the st. Michael the archangel that altar is Now when you go there's a picture of what alphondratus bonds always saw our lady but He looked up and he saw The blessed virgin Mary and all over splendor There before him And he says she made a sign to me that I was to Kneel down and to be quiet And he did that and he says something like and she seemed very happy about that or very content or something She didn't say anything to him and what he says She said nothing yet. I knew everything She infused the holy catholic faith from those great those right those rays coming from those rings because she was wearing he was wearing that metal She infused the fullness of the faith and alphondratus bond He tried three times to look up at her and he couldn't do it He kept trying but she was so resplendent he found he could only lift his eyes as far as her hands He could lift his eyes as far as her hands and see the the graces flowing out on him But he couldn't look up at her anymore. He kept trying and he couldn't do it Now you can imagine the surprise when theodore comes out of the sacristy Comes out of the sacristy and there's alphons prostrate on the floor weeping So he goes up and he taps him a couple times. He's like alphons alphons alphons And finally alphons comes to the senses and he says Take me out of here. You got to get me out of here And he's weeping and he's muttering things like how beautiful What how beautiful he's saying all these things the family can sense So theodore basically carries him out of the church and outside alphons is a complete disaster I mean he's he's overcome with joy and can't stop weeping He keeps saying beautiful things About the faith and about the the truth of the faith and and how how silly he was and how beautiful it all is and but he keeps weeping and Finally theodore he doesn't know what's going on He's like do I need to get a doctor and what's and he says to him, you know, please tell me something's like I need to see a confessor because what I have to say can only be said kneeling So he knew he had to he had to he What he had just experienced was so beautiful He could only explain it to somebody on his knees and it had to be a priest What happened? How do you know that has to be a priest? How do you know it has to be kneeling? But he also knew that in the church the blessed sacrament was there and it was an awful thing He said did not be baptized and to be in the presence of the blessed sacrament. That's what he said You know now God forbid we say it, but that's what he said You think it'd be it'd be upset about talking inside the church now Yeah That's a good point He became a priest though Yeah, so right after that what happened was he was he was already baptized I think was on the jan so this was in This all happened It would have been january Maybe it was a 17th or 18th something like that. It was like it was the middle of january And by january 30 31st was his baptism Now normally had to wait a year or two years He went to meet with a priest so they went down to visit the priest at Chiesa di Jezu that's the Jezuic church a beautiful mural of people being cast out of heaven into hell That's because after the Protestant revolution reformation that that's the artwork that's on the the ceiling there. It's magnificent They went there and met with a good priest and The priest was able to get he listened to him for a long time was able to get a bit out of him But alphonse really had a hard time because it was such an emotional thing that he just would weep between like every other word So they decided let's go give thanks for this And they went and visited uh saint peters And then uh saint saint mary major and a couple other churches But at saint peters they went in at saint peters They have a chapel there where the blessed sacrament is reserved and they went in there and saint or alphonse radispawn felt he felt overcome with dread and It was the fact that he wasn't baptized he felt He felt he couldn't sustain The presence the almighty presence of our lord and the blessed sacrament And so he would almost faint being in the presence of the of the blessed sacrament And so he would have to be taken away from there because he couldn't he couldn't handle it Because he knew he wasn't baptized. He couldn't he wanted baptism immediately, but he couldn't sustain that presence So they took him to the chapel of the blessed virgin That's the saint peters. I don't know what chapel they're talking about. I mean our chapel I don't know if that means the chapel right across the the nave A dedicated to the amount of conception Which has now a gate in front of it. Maybe they didn't have a gate before that's where the choir is And the the cannons of the cathedral not the cathedral, but of saint peters they go to The chanther office. I don't know if that's the chapel I mean, but one of the chapel of the blessed virgin saint peters They went there and he said here. I feel I feel completely console Whenever he was around our lady, he felt there was only what he said. There's only mercy here Beautiful. That's a beautiful thought I remember reading about him just when you talk about crying. He was kissing the metal and thanking our lady age of repeatedly Yeah That's right when he ran into her when when when he came out the way he explained it He just kept kissing the metal That was to show what had just happened when he took him out of the out of the church. So And long story short, he became a evangelist for the jews, right? Yeah, so he got baptized and it was just on a quick note His baptism was was quite a quite a splendid thing You can still get the book alfondratus the conversion of alfondratus bond It was written by his friend that theodore boussierre the one who gave him the medal But they recount the baptism now when this happened when this conversion happened It immediately spread like wildfire all through rome And the people at rome were so edified by the fact that this had happened that our lady would do something so beautiful That a lot of the faithful packed that church for that baptism And they saw this This young 28 year old man who was very you know, he was still in his prime In a white robe. He was very proud just two weeks earlier. He's very proud now They referred to him as this docile little lamb And he's kissing the ground and they're doing all the things that the baptism requires But the really beautiful thing was when he went up to receive the blessed sacrament for the first time As he approached because he had the he had the knowledge of the face faith infused into him. It's different than us. We believe But he had that full knowledge infused into him and we don't know exactly what that means But he had a different kind of belief And so when he approached the altar for the first time with our lord during mass To receive it to communion rail He he could barely they had to carry him there and support him It was the good priest who cataclysm and a sponsor They had to support him there so he could receive the blessed sacrament when he received it. He was so He was so emotionally overcome That his body like stopped functioning that he couldn't walk they had to carry him back He was he was sobbing with with with great tenderness and joy from from this union Of receiving our lord in the blessed sacrament So in that Shortly after he was able to enter into the Jesuits and then he became a priest and him and his brother fiat or Radis Bond they both went to Jerusalem where they they worked for the conversion of the Jews And that's the that's the life of alphonse radis bond it is a I first read about this in the book By I think it was catholic labor race confessor that wrote the book on the history of miraculous metal trying to get it republished And uh, that's just one of many Stories, but I'll this is the most famous Isn't there one in the united states that happened in the was it the 60s and 50s? Yeah happened in the 20s 20s Newman Caught Newman and I I've encouraged people before to go on pilgrimage there, but then they said Excuse me fryer. Have you ever seen the church? No, I've never seen the church, but so maybe it's not the best place to go on pilgrimage But it's a really interesting story it happened in mississippi And it was a black man, and I haven't sorted out all the details exactly If he was guilty or not guilty, but his mother or his grandmother Her husband I think it was like a second husband or something like that That Was abusing her. I don't know if he was beating her or what but claud I think had enough of it And I think he may have killed the guy. I don't know if it's accidentally or intentionally But regardless being a black man in Mississippi in the 20s You know you didn't have a even now you see that there's that there's a famous case right now in george with that That young man that was jogging through a neighborhood. I mean you still see sometimes things aren't working out so well with uh with the white black situation some of these states but So claud went to jail And he was going to be on death row And he was on death row and there was another death row inmate there and claud And the the death row inmate there was like irish catholic white irish catholic But he had a medal of the blessed virgin a little one around his neck and claud liked it He just asked he just said what's that around your neck and this this um Bad catholic it was on death row there He just rips it off says some blasphemy and throws it on the ground so you can take it Claude picks it up And he cherished it, you know claud thought this was very it was a very nice. No well that night That night this beautiful woman appears to him while he's sleeping. I don't say in a dream, but while he's sleeping Comes to his bedside And claud looks at her and he's you know, he doesn't know whether to be afraid because it's uh an apparition uh like a ghost or You know or just to Be incomplete all because the most beautiful thing he's ever seen before And all is this uh, this beautiful lady said was If you want me to be your mother and you to be my son call for a catholic priest And so she went away And he scrambled for a catholic priest and this good catholic priest came And there's a lot of stuff that happened and I won't go into all of it I encourage anybody to go and learn about claud Newman, but that catholic priest was father Ali Aliiri something like that uh, he was in the what would have been the first world war And in that world war when he was in belgium or something like that He was in a foxhole and he promised our lady if you get me through this i'm going to build a church in your honor Well claud said to the priest Our lady told me to tell you if you didn't believe me that you made her a promise That you were going to build that church and you still haven't built that church And claud was very simple. He was very simple very honest In fact every quote that we have of claud's there's such clarity, but there's such simplicity in what he says It's absolutely brilliant the way he he says things about the faith because our lady Our lady started to cataclyse claud So father had to go and cataclyse claud because claud had asked to be baptized From you know, this what happened with the miraculous medal And uh, so father Aliiri he's going there and he brought two sisters with them To help with the catechism and a couple of inmates also wanted to be catechized So I think there's two others so there's three of them total if i'm not mistaken And um, they would go on to something about Uh Let me read to you one here. I have one. I just pulled this thing up. Let me let me read you this Claude said this we're the priest is talking about the sacrament of confession the sisters are talking about it Okay boys today. This is what the sister said the priest said okay boys today I'm going to teach you about the sacrament of confession and here's what claud said Oh, I know about that The lady told me that when you go to confession, we're kneeling down not before a priest But we're kneeling down before the cross of our sun And that that when we are truly sorry for our sins and we confess our sins The blood he shed flows down over us and washes us free of all our sins They're looking at this guy like wow He didn't know anything about the faith. He's that's yeah, that's that's right claude So Let's see. There's there's another one too Oh, then so then because he boarded out like that claud said this. Oh, don't be angry. I didn't uh Don't be angry. Don't be angry. I didn't mean to I didn't mean to blur it out That's what that's what claud mean. He was a real humble beautiful soul And so he also our lady also told claud that uh when when when he goes to confession It's kind of like a telephone It uh, you just you're on the telephone with god and you're able to tell god everything but through You can imagine our lady using this example of a telephone and talking to claud and explaining it to So our lady catechized claud And got him prepared for this so now Claude becomes a catholic he got baptized maybe a couple of weeks before he's supposed to be executed And you can find pictures of this claud before he was the die They asked him and he had become very precious even to the To all the inmates but also very much to the The warden and then because he was a very sweet soul, you know, so that they're very much like claud They were going to miss him and they felt bad they had to execute him now But there was that one catholic that that bad catholic who ripped off the metal and threw it He hated claud You can imagine a practice conscience, but he hated claud So now it comes time for claud's execution And they come to him and they said what's your last request and he said well Everybody's real sad about this and so I want to have a party so that everybody can can celebrate a little bit Everybody can have some cake and whatever so they have a party for everybody for himself, but for everybody And and then claud goes to execution day, but you see him before he kneels down He says his buried devout prayer before he goes out Now it comes time for the execution close to it and the warden barges in and says there's been a stay of execution for two weeks Claude breaks down in tears uncontrollably weeping and saying why Why would they why would god do this to me? And the priest came over to console him and just said I said claud, you know, you you've got you've got a In claud's response was if you had seen what I would see you'd want to die too You'd want to die too that that's that's another that's another teaching for us catholics We try to prolong our lives forever And we we're so afraid to die when what we have to look forward to if we live for heaven We get to see the blessed virgin and the most holy trinity But no we want to stay here so we can go shopping and wear masks on our faces or whatever else I was thinking of that peo line when uh somebody was saying one of his one of the brothers said hey That's a beautiful statue. It's like the most beautiful statue to add at the at the uh at wherever they were staying And uh, he goes She looks like that. I don't want to be there Yeah So then claud the way the priest decided to console claud He said okay claud I want you to offer these two weeks You're suffering for not being able to die right now. This is what's called suffering I want you to offer the suffering of not being able to die For the conversion of that inmate that hates you and claud was like, yeah, I'll do that So claud offered all of his suffering all of his prayers for that inmate and then it came clauds and two weeks it came clauds uh execution day And the secular journalists who were there Right and testified to the fact they say never have we seen someone go to the electric chair so happy He died with a smile on his face That's incredible. Now the story gets better It comes time for the execution of that horrible catholic who was blaspheming All the way up to the point of the putting the mask on and where they're going to electrocute him And the priest came over and tried to hear his confession and he was blaspheming. He tried to spit on the warden. I mean it was There was no hope for this guy So get ready to put the mask on he says wait a minute wait a minute wait a minute And he's looking up in the Corner of the room and he says get me a priest get me a priest They're like, all right So they went got the priest is still there. So they got the priest that came over here heard his confession But the warden his interest was was was was was uh was perked perked up and then uh, and so he went over and he said All right What happened? You were looking up there. You were blaspheming. What happened? I saw claud And he was the blessed virgin And he obtained from the blessed virgin the grace that I would see my place in hell So that one for that that this is an interesting point it won for that That uh that prisoner it was going to be executed. It won for him the grace To fear it was an imperfect contrition, right? But he had to confess to be able to be saved Because a perfect confet contrition you can't be saved by confession And so there's a priest right there our lady obtained for him imperfect contrition He confessed and he was executed And he saved let's I mean we can pretty well presume. I mean he didn't have anything to lose. I doubt he hit anything Claude Newman and you can still visit his grave. I've looked it up on google I'd love to go stop by there. It's in mississippi and pray at his grave at some point time but hopefully someday there'll be a cause for his beatification because it just seems like He would be a beautiful Stain the american saint to have Risen to the altar here in america, right? Especially in the least catholic state in the united states of america. Oh, is that what it is? Mississippi's number one on the south cologne is number two Oh, wow I used to live in the second the least catholic state in there mississippi's the only one I could pull that off but yeah, I No prior that was awesome. Appreciate it. Uh, any other thoughts on the miraculous mental in general or another or any other story Well, I will just say quickly. I know it gets long and your listeners don't like to watch long things Who cares? I don't know. I mean if they want to watch they can watch you But you said mac St. Maximilian Colby when he when he founded the mi It was because he heard the story of alfondratus bond. There was two things that happened. He saw that um that horrible procession it was the year it was a two-year anniversary 200 year anniversary of mason's I've seen the picture of it. They actually have a picture At the seraphic college. That's the conventional college at rome Um, and the old refectory is a museum now just has some things But they have a little picture and it has a picture of that procession I've looked I can't find anything like online or anything in that procession You can find other was on the processions, but not the one that happened at rome that year But they walked right up to the front door with a banner that just with a Satan crushing the head of st. Michael the archangel and it said satan will rule in the Vatican And they walked right under the pope's window straight up to st. Peter's door When he heard about that he was indignant and then same year was the 75 anniversary if i'm not mistaken of alfondratus bonds conversion And so that that is what was the impetus for st. Maximilian Colby Founding the militia the immaculata And so he used the miraculous medal as what he called bullets and the other saints have done it as well But that's what it is. It just our lady promised That's what it would be It was an instrument that she wants to give to fight against As she crushes the head of the serpent that was what's prophesized about our lady She is the the one who perfectly The reason she's without sin is she perfectly assists our lord In our redemption because our lord asked for that and and wanted her for that In the in the dogmatic the bold dogmatic definition pious and nine refers to That they were written in one in the same decree Anyways the one in the same decree which means our lord The decree that was written from all eternity For our lord to come as our redeemer Our lady was written the exact same decree That those are the words that the the pope uses So she she's giving us a tool through the miraculous medal It's a way that she crushes the head of the serpent and what a what a horrible way for somebody who's so proud To have their head crushed through a little metal That's powerful our lady is he's just wear this medal and I don't I'll use that to crush his head What a humiliation So we we should really go around and do our best I think to promote To wear the miraculous medal and you can get these there's a online. There's these caramelites in colorado I would recommend they have some really nice the bigger miraculous medals and they're nickel plated. They don't cost so that much Those are really nice ones From what I can tell there's probably other places as well I would encourage people wear a large miraculous medal as a symbol of your consecration If you're not consecrated a bus of virgin Mary, you just need to do it You need to you become consecrated to her and I would encourage the consecration prayer of of st. Maximilian Colby Because it has the theology behind that consecration prayer is Is based on the immaculate conception where st. Louis de monfort is not because he's not coming from that theological framework Where st. Maximilian Colby is coming from that theological framework. It's not to diminish in any way The consecration st. Louis de monfort. That's not my intention So I would encourage a website What's that that's on your website, right? Yeah, there's a there's a the consecration prayers on the website and then this year for the navina for the immaculate conception I gave a a nine-day reflection In preparation for the immaculate conception, but what to prepare people for consecration. So if they want They're about 30 minutes long each one and then at the end you have this Consecration prayer st. Maximilian And then I encourage you Invest in one of these beautiful metals and wear it around your neck As always I'll put the links underneath the videos in the show notes description section So yeah, if you can send me the colorado link, I don't didn't know about that group But yeah, if you can send me if they have a website, I'll put that underneath there, too Okay. Yeah, I'll do it So what's saying is get some metals pass them out and let the immaculate take care of the rest You know, I found I've given metals to I give metals to people when I just go around walking I already I'm strong and blessed and I just hand them to them And I've had people come back later people had no interest in the faith whatsoever I don't know if they converted or not But they would tell me how thankful they were of that metal And they would even have relatives that would find me later and say how they talked about it So some people it may feel like they were just giving these trinkets out and it doesn't mean I've given the Protestant preachers before You know, you never know what our lady's going to do There's stories about people just seeing the metal on a table and not being able to take their eyes off of it Our lady can do what she wants We simply want to try to plant seeds and Like same x-men Kobe says hit him with a metal hit him with a hit him with a bullet of our lady Amen appreciate oh fire. Thank you again as always