Comments on: Running the Rosary

By: Running the Rosary Reprise: Peace. Be Still. | Catholic Exchange

Running the Rosary Reprise: Peace. Be Still. | Catholic Exchange — Mon, 27 Jul 2009 04:04:04 +0000

[...] the Evangelist". God has chosen irony as His will for me, again. On the very day my essay, "Running the Rosary" , was published, I suffered a serious ankle injury which left me in a cast and dependent on [...]

By: rman

rman — Sun, 05 Jul 2009 12:54:08 +0000

Please let me briefly tell you how being a serious Christian and athletics, running in particular, is a most powerful force for Christianity in these seemingly apocalyptic times in Canada where homosexuality is now hardwired into our mainstream conversation and where the liability now comes mostly from within our church. I am single because I made bad career choices, so in midlife I find myself in the middle of this controversy. Where my first reaction might be to throw the Bible at Catholics, I find it works better to get respect from them first by showing them my marathon medals and my training schedule keeps me out of their inner New Age circles, yet still able to be part of the regular parish music team! They can see that being a real Christian is motivating me to success and we can all have a few good laughs together as Catholics, in spite of these apocalyptic end time changes around us! God Bless! Richard in Prince George, BC Canada

By: rman

rman — Sat, 27 Jun 2009 03:19:54 +0000

Awesome article Stacey! We have the Mad Moose Marathon in Prince George, BC Canada, but most of us go and do Red Deer, Kelowna or Vancouver/Victoria. I can tell you that it is the Catholic runners that keep me Catholic because I can say we all need each other. I perform Christian country music and contemporary Christian music which has an actual physical energizing effect on me – it makes you feel close to God. In Prince George, the First Nations people also relate to runners and because I play their gospel music, I feel this is the direction I am going in my Christian life – with all the drugs around and the moral relativism and New Age in all the “white man’s” churches, they really appreciate a simple Christian message they can relate to! Also, a lot of runners are known as social misfits, but nice people just the same, which is the real reason I run, not for any religious reasons, which are nevertheless a surprising, pleasant spin off of running!

richard (pace dog) in Prince George, BC

By: elkabrikir

elkabrikir — Sat, 27 Jun 2009 00:46:42 +0000

No wonder St Paul used the metaphor of “running the race” and “competing well” to describe the experience of living as a baptized Christian. I’m amazed and pleased by how this topic has resonated with CE readers. Sean, your point, as simple as it is, gave me chills as I envisioned you on the raod at athe back of Lake Rotorua. (Remember the infamous Rosi Ruiz who jumped on a subway during the Boston Marathon…..when nobody was looking? Even if she hadn’t been caught, how could she feel any satisfaction in crossing the finish line. She’s like the Roman emperors St Paul referenced., who didn’t compete, yet wore the victor’s crown.)

So it is with us even though we may appear to all be on our knees praying or mindlessly running.) When Jesus separates the sheep from the goats, I pray he doesn’t look at me and say, “I do not know you.”

Nfpdad, I liked your comment that “exercise is a precise map of the faith life”. I’ve always felt like that too. However, some folks can make the run the end game for them…..and then problems begin. (It’s like an addiction.) For me, running is a means to an end: deeper faith, better health, stress relief, pure pleasure, freedom…………

By: SeanReynoldsNZ

SeanReynoldsNZ — Sat, 27 Jun 2009 00:44:15 +0000

Thinking of the issue of getting back in shape after each run reminds me of the Australian athlete the late Kerryn McCann. She won the gold medal at the 2002 Manchester Commonwealth Games, and also at the 2006 Melbourne Commonwealth Games. She also had three children: One in 1997, her second in 2003, and her third in 2007. She died from cancer in December 2008.

But the point I want to make is that she still went to the effort to keep fit and compete successfully on an international level after having children: They may have even been her reason for doing so.

By: SeanReynoldsNZ

SeanReynoldsNZ — Sat, 27 Jun 2009 00:32:08 +0000

I remember one of my Evangelical Protestant friends comparing the Protestant idea of the altar call where everyone gets excited to someone getting saved … and then the new convert is left to their own devices as being like a crowd in a stadium cheering as the gun goes at the start of a Marathon …. and then leaving the stadium. I know from my wife, a convert to Catholicism, that it is very hard to find support in one’s Faith after one has been baptised because there is interest shown in the RCIA candidates before they are baptised, but then they vanish from our sights.

Baptism is only the beginning. For marriage, the wedding ceremony is only the same as the starters gun. I remember from completing the Rotorua Marathon in New Zealand three times that the real decision on whether or not you go the distance is made when you are on the road at the back of Lake Rotorua, where no one is watching you.

By: Posts about Holy Spirit as of June 26, 2009 | PRAYtheREVOLUTION

Posts about Holy Spirit as of June 26, 2009 | PRAYtheREVOLUTION — Fri, 26 Jun 2009 16:18:20 +0000

[...] to God by saying something like, “Dear Holy Spirit of God, You are the Spirit of … Running the Rosary – newcesite.com 06/26/2009 Perhaps it’s the 11 kids or my own undisciplined [...]

By: goral

goral — Fri, 26 Jun 2009 13:38:23 +0000

“I’ve even heard the silence of a fawn nestling in moss. She echoed the silence of my soul at prayer.”

What a beautiful picture of our soul, weak and vulnerable and yet has the knowing to stay or to leap and run for safety as our Lord provides the cover.

With eleven children it looks like you’ve been adding an extra Hail Mary to every decade, certainly better than falling asleep.
Gotta run.

By: redwallabbey

redwallabbey — Fri, 26 Jun 2009 13:31:40 +0000

As another mom of 11, I really appreciated the encouragement to both pray and exercise. I need both to do my job! While I can’t run anymore, I walk regularly. We can often find excuses to put off both the prayer and the exercise but then both our souls and body suffer.

And thanks also for the reminder that all we do as parents can be a form of prayer when we direct it to God. Thanks for the encouragement to keep running the race(even if it is the form of a fast walk!).

By: HomeschoolNfpDad

HomeschoolNfpDad — Fri, 26 Jun 2009 12:10:10 +0000

So much from this article highlights the realities of faith, not least the lovely spectacle of a mother of eleven who runs and runs and runs. One of the temptations of engaging in frequent physical exercise is the temptation to worship our own body, rather than to glorify God in it. This is no different from the temptation that a pastor faces if he is a good homilist: he may be tempted to receive for himself the adulation that is rightfully God’s. It is also no different from the temptations that couples may face when practicing NFP: the couple may be tempted to misuse NFP in a contraceptive way.

Thus, in its subsurface, the article identifies precisely the problems with today’s world and today’s Church. Too many of us want to take a pill to solve life’s problems. A pill to keep the babies from coming. A pill to make me sing or speak well. A pill to make me skinny. A pill for everything, even if it doesn’t exist, and then we’ll go invent that pill, too.

There is no pill for life. There is no pill for faith. And if we are too lazy to remove each his rump from off the coach, both figuratively and literally, then we die. Today those deaths come not so much froom syphillis and smallpox as from cancer, diabetes and heart disease. For some, these ailments are unavoidable. But for many, the solution is to simply get moving – and to do so now, before the ailment comes.

The modern faith is much weakened, and there are many reasons for this. But one of them, certainly, is the habitual reach for a pill whenever difficulty looms. In some cases (e.g. cancer, diabetes, and heart disease), the pills are necessary medicine once the ailment hits. In other cases (e.g. contraception), the pills are objective moral evils. But in all cases, there could be less need for the pills if we could only remove from ourselves the desire to look to pills as cure-alls for every one of life’s problems.