00:31Hi. I'm Fr. Chris Alar of the Marian Fathers here at the
National Shrine of the Divine Mercy and we
00:36are honored to have you back with us here
on Living Divine Mercy.
00:41How did God prepare the world for the coming
of the Messiah?
00:47It was through the Holy Spirit.
00:50When the Church reads the Old Testament, she
searches for what the Spirit wants to tell
00:55us about Christ, since the Holy Spirit is
the one "who has spoken through the prophets."
01:02And the Holy Spirit s spouse, Mary is critical
as well because she was there in the Upper
01:08Room when the Holy Spirit came at Pentecost,
which is coming up this Sunday.
01:22When I was in the Holy Land, I went to the
Upper Room where Mary and the Apostles hid
01:29in fear of the Jews.
01:31That little place is incredibly important
because four of the seven Sacraments were
01:39Yes, the Eucharist, Holy Orders, Confession,
and Confirmation.
01:46The Eucharist and the ordination of the first
Priests happened at the Last Supper in the
01:52The grace of the Sacrament of Confession also
happened in the Upper Room in John 20:23 when
01:59Jesus appeared and told the Apostles, the
first Priests, that whose sins they forgive
02:05are forgiven and whose sins they retain are
retained in Heaven.
02:11And, it is also the place of the Sacrament
of Confirmation because the Spirit of God
02:17came upon the Apostles and they were sealed
in the Holy Spirit at Pentecost, which by
02:25the way means fifty.
02:27So, Pentecost happens fifty days after the
Resurrection and completes the Easter season.
02:36The Apostles were now sealed in the Spirit
because earlier in that same Upper Room Jesus
02:42"breathed" on them to give them the Holy Spirit,
like God did when He breathed life into Adam.
02:51Now, with the gift of the Holy Spirit, a new
creation began not one bound by sin but one
03:00freed from sin, and it happened, the Bible
tells us, on the very first Divine Mercy Sunday.
03:09It was when Jesus appeared to the Apostles
on the first Sunday after Easter and said,
03:16Peace . Peace is not just an absence of war,
but a removal of sins and the cleansing of
03:23our souls, which happens now on every Divine
Mercy Sunday.
03:27Then, as we said, this was followed by the
sealing of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost a
03:34And with the gift of the Holy Spirit, the
Apostles (and us) can now be empowered to
03:41evangelize to be going out and telling the
world about Jesus and why we want to give
03:49Thus, the Third Person of the Trinity, this
Holy Spirit is the one most active in the
03:55world today, if we let Him.
03:59It was in a previous show that we said that
we know Christ, that He is the visible image
04:06of God the Father, but now we need to point
out that it is the Holy Spirit who reveals
04:13Christ the Son to us.
04:16Jesus tells us this in 1 Corinthians 12:3,
no one can say Jesus is Lord except by the
04:27This is hard to grasp because the Spirit does
not speak by Himself, surprisingly.
04:34As we said, he has spoken through the prophets.
04:38But by the Spirit s power we hear the Father
s word when He speaks, and that Word is Jesus
04:48Himself, the Eternal Word.
04:49So, we can see the line here.
04:52The Father has been revealed to us by the
Son, and now after Pentecost, the Son is fully
04:59revealed to us by the Holy Spirit.
05:02And we can come now to know each of them through
the prayers of our own Faith.
05:08We know that God the Father and who He is
by the Our Father prayer; and we can know
05:13the Son, Jesus, by the Jesus prayer.
05:17Jesus Christ, Son of the Living God, have
mercy on me, a poor sinner.
05:24He s the one that brings us mercy.
05:26And we can come to know the Holy Spirit by
the Come Holy Spirit prayer, which is: Come
05:31Holy Spirit, fill the hearts of Your faithful
and enkindle in them the fire of Your Love.
05:38Now back to the Upper Room where Jesus first
appeared on the Sunday after Easter, the first
05:44Divine Mercy Sunday.
05:46He would have appeared to the Apostles just
as we see Him in the Divine Mercy Image because
05:52here He is resurrected, and from His heart
comes blood and water, just like it did on
05:59the Cross when the blood and water poured
out.
06:03But did you know that this blood and water
that we see in the Divine Mercy Image is the
06:10Yes, the Church is born of blood and water,
and in practical terms this is the same Holy
06:18Spirit that was received at Pentecost when
the Church was born.
06:23It was Mary and the Apostles who received
the Holy Spirit at Pentecost after waiting
06:29nine days in prayer and it is where we get
the tradition of the Novena.
06:34Novenas are nine consecutive days of prayer
for a particular intention that represent
06:41those nine days of prayer that Mary and Christ
s Apostles did.
06:46So, and it s also interesting, a representation
of the nine months that Jesus spent in the
06:53womb of Mary before His birth.
06:57Like Jesus our Head, we as His Body, are also
to be born of Mary and the Holy Spirit.
07:06So, nine days of prayer thus represented the
gestation period prior to the birth of the
07:14Church on Pentecost.
07:16You know, novenas are powerful because they
are persistent prayer.
07:22Remember, Jesus said to continually ask, seek,
and knock for what we need.
07:28And, novenas are a great way to do that.
07:31Finally, our benevolent Lord is sure to give
us many gifts if we open our hearts to receive
07:40In fact, we get seven Gifts, known as the
Gifts of the Holy Spirit.
07:45Now, the first three seem very similar: wisdom,
understanding, and knowledge.
07:51Again, seeming similar, what is the difference?
07:56Well, they are different.
07:58wisdom is simply knowing the truth, which
few seem to do today; understanding is seeing
08:07things as others see them, and thus we can
grow in compassion and empathy for the plight
08:13of others; and knowledge is to see things
as God sees them, basically an illumination
08:24Now the other gifts, these include counsel,
which is the ability to make good decisions.
08:31We have fortitude, which is courage.
08:35We have piety, which is proper reverence like
at Mass, having that natural reverence.
08:42And we have fear of the Lord, which is not
servile fear, it s more a fear of offending
08:50God, more than maybe fear of punishment.
08:53Now, once we have these gifts of the Holy
Spirit, we can go into the world with these
08:59gifts and bear fruit.
09:01So, we also have the twelve Fruits of the
Holy Spirit.
09:07They are: charity, joy, peace, patience, kindness,
goodness, generosity, gentleness, faithfulness,
09:21modesty, self-control and chastity.
09:26So in other words, the gifts of the Holy Spirit
that we are given, especially at Confirmation,
09:33should not remain dormant in us, but are to
be used in the world, for us to go out and
09:43All who are Confirmed are equipped with these
gifts of the Holy Spirit and they have the
09:48tools to go out into the world and to live
a virtuous and holy life, and thus make it
09:56Now, speaking of being inspired by the Holy
Spirit to go out into the world and teach,
10:02let's hear the story of Divine Mercy Academy,
a great school of young people in Maryland,
10:07led by a man by the name of Ali Ghaffari.
10:10He truly was led himself by the Holy Spirit
to go out and evangelize.
10:16Welcome to Wednesday.
10:33Making saints might seem like an unorthodox
curriculum for teachers, but then, Divine
10:35Mercy Academy in Pasadena, Maryland, is not
your ordinary school.
10:40It's also the end of a personal journey for
its founder, Ali Ghaffari, who at one time
10:45in his life had little use for organized religion
and even less for belief in God.
10:52I just remember walking past a church service
and people, seeing people in there and just
10:57thinking that they're all brainwashed.
10:59That's because discerning any sort of Divine
presence in his life seemed impossible.
11:04Starting with his mother.
11:06She gave Ali life, but as a struggling single
mom, could offer little more.
11:12She got pregnant at fifteen and had me when
she was sixteen.
11:16My mom then married my dad and they tried
to make a go of it.
11:19They had one more child, my brother, about
twenty months younger than I. Did the best
11:26They lasted about three years and then they
split up.
11:29She got a job as a bartender, so we moved
around every year.
11:33We were never in the same place.
11:35We always had roommates.
11:36My mom had become an alcoholic and a drug
addict.
11:40And so, we always had a revolving door of
men coming to the house.
11:43We were on government assistance.
11:45My mom attempted suicide when I was in, around
first grade.
11:52And so when my brother and I went to live
with an aunt and uncle for a year.
11:56She went to rehab and she'd come back from
time to time.
11:59and then she would pray with us.
12:00So, when she came out, she had more faith
going through a Twelve-Step Program.
12:05Then Ali's mom met Dan.
12:07They got married and Dan came in and he instilled
a sense of structure in our lives; an emphasis
12:14on doing well in school and working hard.
12:19And he put us in sports and he was, he coached
us in our sports and he expected us to, to
12:24get good grades and to do our very best in
everything we do.
12:28Private school led to college with a new goal
in mind.
12:32I was going to be a surgeon and an atheist
surgeon, and I was just going to do the best
12:37I could in that path.
12:39It was then that Dan introduced Ali to Paul.
12:43They sat together on a back porch overlooking
the hills of Vermont, discussing Ali's life.
12:49And that evening he said, I could have brought,
I could have thrown rocks at you, but I came
12:54to throw you a rope and I want to bring you
up.
12:56And he said, Do you believe in God?
12:58And I said, No, I don't see any evidence for
God around.
13:03And he said, Evidence is everywhere and you
just have to have eyes to see it.
13:06And so that set me off about two years of
just soul searching about who, you know, what's
13:13the right way to live.
13:14Paying for medical school, though, was now
top priority.
13:18A friend, an army surgeon, suggested a way:
why not let the military pay for it?
13:25Ali joined the Navy and soon worked his way
up to a childhood fantasy, flying F-18 jets.
13:33His career showed him the face of war, and
Ali patrolled oil platforms in the Persian
13:38Gulf, Iraq, and then in Afghanistan, in support
of operations in Helmand Province.
13:45The next year saw medical school go away,
but also marriage to Mary, who converted to
13:51Catholicism and starting a family.
13:55It was also time for Paul to come back into
Ali's life.
13:58And he said By the way, how are you doing
with your faith?
14:01I said, Well, I've decided that I believe
in God now.
14:04He said, Does the truth comport itself to
us or us to the truth?
14:08I said, Well, gosh, we have to comport ourselves
to the truth.
14:12And that's, that has to be the answer.
14:16But I know it's not in the Catholic faith.
14:18For the next eight months or so, we went back
and forth via email, just debating all the
14:23tenets of the Catholic Church.
14:24I pulled all these things up and I threw them
at him.
14:27And Paul was like this Jedi master.
14:28He just calmly deflected each of these things
left and right, and it was infuriating for
14:34After about eight months of this, I said,
If you can't beat them, join them.
14:38So, I said, Teach me.
14:40And so. he said, All right.
14:41Let's start with the Greeks.
14:43The Greeks teach you how to think and how
to recognize truth.
14:46In fact, you know, in the salvation history,
Athens and Jerusalem come together at the
14:51time of Christ in this, this beautiful philosophy
which seeks this, wants to know what truth
14:58And that is just the absolute genius and beauty
of the Catholic faith.
15:01For me, that's the mark of the truth.
15:03And I wouldn't want anything else other than
that.
15:05Moving from city to city, working for the
Navy, Ali felt a certain restlessness.
15:11He was searching for a school with the kind
of classical focus that it so appealed to
15:16him, but also where religious instruction
was more than just one more subject.
15:21While he was teaching at the Naval Academy,
Mary and Ali found a nearby tutorial that
15:28But with both of them working full time, its
two-day-a-week instruction was not enough
15:34and administrator told them there was no way
it could be expanded to five days a week.
15:40Then she looked right at Ali and said, But
someone needs to because there is a need in
15:45And so we came home and Ali kinda told me
that he was thinking that maybe God was calling
15:53My initial human reaction was just, Oh man.
15:55We just were so unqualified, so unprepared.
15:57This isn't going to work.
16:00But the idea would not go away.
16:03To learn more, Ali attended an Institute for
Catholic Classical Liberal Education Conference.
16:09There was a woman who came, sat next to him
and said, Hey, Ali, you know, I hear you want
16:19In that moment, it just tipped me over the
fence from once, from just sitting on the
16:23fence into doing it.
16:25And I said, All right, yeah, let's do it.
16:26We really had thought about having St. Kateri
Tekakwitha as our patron saint.
16:32Of course, that, that's kind of a mouthful,
especially for young children.
16:36And we were just sitting around again trying
to put our human will on, on this, and all
16:42of a sudden, the same woman who had approached
Ali at the ICLE conference and said, I want
16:47to help you start the school.
16:49She was sitting back and all of a sudden she
just said Divine Mercy Academy.
16:53And everybody in the room got silent and said,
Yes.
16:57As a result of all of the obstacles that we've
had to overcome in building and founding the
17:02school and then seeing its growth.
17:05I can't tell you how many times I've had to
say, Jesus, I trust in You.
17:09And so personally, my faith has grown and
my trust in the Lord and my expectation that
17:14He will provide for us has just gone off the
charts.
17:17Divine Mercy Academy started small with a
handful of teachers and students in the basement
17:23of a Lutheran church, and once, when facilities
were not available for two weeks, Ali and
17:29Mary held classes at a location they knew
would be open, their home.
17:35We had a little classroom set up in all of
our different areas; in our dining room we
17:38had some kids and we had some others in a
in a room in the basement, and we had some
17:43kids out in the garage.
17:44And then we also would set up things outside
like kickball or I guess Foursquare and we
17:51had a bounce house at the time.
17:53And so, our neighbor said our house looked
like a circus because that was just about
18:06The history is the core.
18:08And then we wrap our literature and our logic,
grammar, all of those things around the historical
18:15timeframe that the kids happened to be in
in their particular year.
18:18So that they will bring in whatever classic
works that belong that pertain to that particular
18:25We really wanted them to know that God is,
is part of everything that they do and not
18:32just one subject once a week or once a day.
18:36That it was through God, that we see everything
in our world; that we see science, that we
18:41learn science that is through God.
18:43That, that math, you know, comes to life.
18:45Yes, we want them to learn the academics.
18:47We want them to be fully functional humans.
18:49But our mission is to make them saints.
18:52Our mission is to get them to know and love
and serve God throughout their whole life.
18:56Divine Mercy Academy now has one-hundred-twenty
students and is looking to expand.
19:02Oh, and whatever happened to Paul?
19:05He and Ali still collaborate as authors of
a book exploring the modern-day predictions
19:17The goal of classical education is to create
people of virtue and to ask the big questions:
19:27What is it to live a good life and to become
people who then influence the culture in a
19:33And so that'll be, I think, what I'll do for
the rest of my life.
19:36Well, what a great story.
19:41Seeing so many awesome young kids and giving
us hope for the future.
19:46Now let's go back to Scripture where we can
hear Father Jim read to us from the Bible
19:50about the coming of the Holy Spirit.
19:59When the Day of Pentecost had come, they were
all together in one place, and suddenly a
20:05sound came from Heaven, like the rush of a
mighty wind and it filled all the house where
20:12And there appeared to them tongues as of fire,
distributed and resting on each one of them,
20:19and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit
and began to speak in other tongues as the
20:25Spirit gave them utterance.
20:26The universe was created by God who breathed
into the first man and woman the breath of
20:33His Spirit so that humanity could know and
love Him.
20:37But humanity disobeyed God and lost the indwelling
gift of His grace.
20:43Through His Death and Resurrection, however,
Jesus won back the gift of sanctifying grace,
20:48and we can now have the Spirit alive within
us.
20:52He now stands ready to pour it out upon anyone
who repents of sin and trusts in His mercy
20:59through the Sacraments of Baptism and Reconciliation.
21:04We can receive our own Pentecost, an invigorating
breath of the spirit if we open our hearts
21:11to Jesus with repentance and trust.
21:14This new life from God can enable us to bear
any burden, love the unlovable and live faithfully
21:22in the light of Christ.
21:24As Saint Faustina writes, Once we open ourselves
to the influence of the Holy Spirit, He Himself
21:32will fulfill what is lacking in us.
21:37Now let's meet a Marian, Deacon Jason Lewis,
my good friend, who I spent time with in Seminary
21:42as he s getting prepared to be ordained to
the Priesthood.
21:46Well, I'm a convert, so I had a pretty radical
conversion into the church through Our Lady
22:04of Medjugorje and my dad and I came into the
church together with my brother.
22:11And I knew almost immediately I felt a sense
of a call right then when I was going through
22:16the process of the RCIA process and Confirmation.
22:20But I thought there is no way that God could
be calling me based upon my own past, in my
22:26sinfulness and all of my inadequacies and
ineptitude.
22:31But I did experience the sense of a call then,
and then the Lord would continue to pursue
22:35me, and I would eventually end up at Franciscan
University in its pre-theologate program studying
22:41Philosophy and Theology to get ready for Seminary.
22:51Well, the very first Marian that I ever met
was our late Fr.
22:58Javorski, who was actually the head of, he
was running our pension in Fatima and I was
23:04visiting Our Lady in Fatima on a pilgrimage
and I didn t have a place to stay.
23:09And so they sent me over to visit with Father
Javorski and he told me about his community
23:14and we actually had a parish in Greensboro,
North Carolina at that time, and he encouraged
23:19me, You have to go see my community when you
go back the United States.
23:23You're from North Carolina.
23:24They re in Greensboro.
23:25You need to go see them there.
23:27And I was like, Yeah, yeah, Father, okay,
I'll go check them out , thinking this guy
23:31was kind of dismissive of him to be honest,
and thinking there's no chance that I'm going
23:34to go three hours away to his parish in Greensboro.
23:37But lo and behold, I ended up going to Franciscan
University.
23:43I met our then Novice, or maybe he was in
pre-Theologate, Don Calloway, Fr.
23:49Don Calloway, and then Father John Larson
and a few other Marians as well because they
23:54were living in Steubenville at that time.
23:57But the truth of the matter is, I really saw,
I didn't really give the Marians a whole lot
24:01of thought at that particular point in time
until a few years later when I met Father
24:06Kaz Chwalek and I went to confession with
him one First Friday in an evening in a parish,
24:13and in that Confession and in the confessional,
I felt as if I was sitting with Jesus Himself.
24:20Jesus, the Divine Mercy, because he just oozed
a love in Divine Mercy in that Confession.
24:26And it was about three weeks later I needed
to go to Confession again.
24:30And so it was at Franciscan University, going
to confession again.
24:33And I spotted Father Kaz.
24:34I was like, Oh, I need to go to Confession
with that guy.
24:39I ended up going to Confession with him a
second time.
24:42And then I knew right then like he had to
be my spiritual director.
24:45So, I started meeting with Father Kaz and
then he gave me a Diary of St Faustina.
24:51He never pushed the Marians, never encouraged
me towards the Marians, never talked about
24:56the Marians as a vocation.
24:57He knew that I was discerning.
24:59He just gave me a Diary.
25:01And lo and behold, we kept meeting week after
week.
25:05Kaz the charism of the Divine Mercy and Our
Lady and when he gave me that Diary, that
25:12just kind of sealed the deal as I started
meditating upon it.
25:15So that's the long story short.
25:18It was through Father Kaz and the Diary and
the charism of Our Lady that really drew me
25:23to the Marians of the Immaculate Conception.
25:27Oh, if souls would only be willing to listen
at least a little to the voice of conscience
25:41and the voice that is, the inspirations - of
the Holy Spirit.
25:46I say at least a little , because once we
open ourselves to the influence of the Holy
25:51Spirit, He himself will fulfill what is lacking
in us.
25:57Once, after Holy Communion, I heard these
words: You are Our dwelling place.
26:05At that moment, I felt in my soul the presence
of the Holy Trinity, the Father, the Son,
26:12and the Holy Spirit.
26:14I felt that I was the Temple of God.
26:17Pentecost, June 5th, 1938.
26:23I got up much earlier than usual and went
to the chapel, steeping myself in the love
26:31Before receiving Holy Communion.
26:32I silently renewed my religious vows.
26:36After Holy Communion, the infinite love of
God swept over me.
26:41My soul was in communion with the Holy Spirit,
who is the same Lord as the Father and the
26:48Well, thank you again, everybody, for joining
us for this episode on Pentecost.
26:54Remember the power of the Holy Spirit and
be with us next week as we talk about Mary
26:59and the Feast of the Visitation and what happened.
27:03And till then, may Almighty God bless you
and yours.
27:06The Father and of the Son, and of the Holy
Spirit.
