“There are few authentic prophetic voices among us, guiding truth-seekers along the right path. Among them is Fr. Gordon MacRae, a mighty voice in the prison tradition of John the Baptist, Maximilian Kolbe, Alfred Delp, SJ, and Dietrich Bonhoeffer.”

— Deacon David Jones

Fr. Gordon J. MacRae 1/1/25 Fr. Gordon J. MacRae 1/1/25

A Glorious Mystery for When the Dark Night Rises

At the dawn of the New Year, the Church honors the Solemnity of Mary, the Holy Mother of God. I met her at the age of nine, part lived experience and part dream.

At the dawn of the New Year, the Church honors the Solemnity of Mary, the Holy Mother of God. I met her at the age of nine, part lived experience and part dream.

January 1, 2025 by Fr Gordon MacRae

To comprehend this post, readers must understand the world of 1962. Something happened in America that dramatically changed our view of ourselves and the world around us, and its tentacles reach deeply into the present day. It brought a sense of futility, a resignation that we are powerless over the great tides of history sweeping us up into their grip, and resistance to evil is futile. So look out for Number One, and live for the moment! That is the great lie of our age.

I turned nine years old in April of 1962. Five months later, I began fifth grade a year younger than everyone else in my class. A month after that, the United States and the Soviet Union approached the very brink of nuclear war during the Cuban Missile Crisis in October, 1962. The administration of President John F. Kennedy discovered that the Soviet Union had placed strategic nuclear missiles in Cuba. Diplomacy failed miserably, and it just exposed our impotence. The United States demanded removal of the missiles and the Soviet Union flatly refused. President Kennedy ordered a naval blockade of Cuba. Kennedy and Nikita Khrushchev were all that stood between us and nuclear annihilation. Fear and deep anxiety engulfed everything — even the 5th grade.

Growing up in the industrial city of Lynn, Massachusetts, just a few miles north of Boston, left us especially vulnerable. Lynn at that time was home to the General Electric Company’s Aircraft Engine Division which was the largest employer in that city and surrounding towns. Its biggest customer was the U.S. military. Children my age were traumatized with fear by the weekly rehearsals for nuclear attack. Upon a signal from school administration we had to rush to extinguish all lights, draw all window shades and then crawl under our desks while sirens blared outside.

The day the Cuban Missile Crisis began, was the day our childhood innocence ended. We were vulnerable in a fragile, unpredictable world, and the anxiety never really left us. It was, perhaps in hindsight, the wrong moment for some of the great black-and-white science fiction films of the fifties to start running as matinees in a local cinema.

I did not understand then that some of those great films were really paradigms of the Cold War, containing within them all the fear and paranoia the Soviet Empire brought to our young minds. Films like “Invasion of the Body Snatchers” and — my favorite of all — “The Day the Earth Stood Still” are today considered Cold War classics. They captured our anxiety and capitalized upon our fears.

Invaders from Mars

I wrote of the North of Boston where I grew up in “February Tales.” Going to a movie theatre alone was a rare occurrence when I was nine years old in 1962. It meant venturing downtown like a free-range kid. Lynn, Massachusetts had two downtown cinemas back then, the Paramount and the Capitol. The latter was in Lynn’s Central Square, and it only opened at night — its marquee preceding every title with a large, mysterious “XXX.” It was strictly off limits.

It took a bit of courage back then for a 9-year-old to board a city bus alone for a Saturday afternoon trek downtown. I reveled in my freedom, but my parents had spies everywhere. When once I ventured too close to the Capitol marquee to see what all those Xs were about, there was hell to pay when I got home!

The Paramount had a Saturday matinee for 35 cents. Lynn’s newspaper, The Daily Evening Item carried an alluring ad, a miniature version of the movie poster for that week’s feature, “Invaders from Mars.” It portrayed a boy my age, aghast at his bedroom window by the scene of a spaceship landing at midnight in an empty field behind his house.

There was really no need for scary movies then. We were already all frightened enough, and those who claimed they were not were lying. But perhaps as kids we were all looking for outlets for our fear, because the real story of politics and nuclear bombs made no sense to us at all. Scary movies became the in thing, and I couldn’t wait to see “Invaders from Mars.”

Thirty-five cents for admission was no challenge at all then. There were always a few soda bottles to be found, and a little rummaging through the easy chair where my father watched a worried-looking Walter Cronkite every night yielded bus fare, and, if I was lucky, enough for that week’s special matinee snack, a Mars Bar.

It rained that Saturday, so just about every kid stuck inside was given bus fare to go see “Invaders from Mars.” The movie was preceded by a few cartoons to quiet us down, then it began. You could hear a pin drop. All the anxiety we had pent up within us was about to play out on the screen.

After the spaceship landed in that field, the boy in the film fell asleep. In the morning, he wondered whether it was all a dream. At breakfast, his mother and father and brother were acting very strangely. At school, his teacher and fellow students were strange, too. As he investigated, the story brought him to an underground tunnel where Martian zombies took direction from a squid-like mastermind managing the takeover of everyone’s mind and soul from its protected glass sphere. Those who today say there is really nothing to fear didn’t live through the Cold War and the Cuban Missile Crisis. I was utterly terrified.

When the movie was over and the lights came on, the older kids who had been throwing popcorn at us all disappeared into the streets. The kids in the middle, who were all my age, sat silently traumatized as the curtain closed. “Invaders From Mars” scared the &#§@ out of us! By the time I came to my senses all the kids I knew had scattered. None wanted to be seen in the fits of fright with which they departed “Invaders from Mars.”

A Glorious Mystery

Out on a rainy, darkened Union Street in downtown Lynn, I had missed the bus. It would be an hour before another came, and I had a sudden intense longing for the safety of home. So I set out on foot to walk the two miles through the city streets as it grew dark. Even today, when I am feeling vulnerable, anxious and alone, I dream of that trek at age nine through the city streets at night.

As I walked home on that day, my imagination raced ahead of me, and I felt fragile and alone. I was on the edge of tears for an accumulation of reasons I could never articulate. At times, the reality of feeling vulnerable strikes hard. I knew there were no evil Martian zombies, but I had an ill-defined sense that evil had just paid our world a visit and it changed us. We lived in a dangerous world, then, and since then its danger has exponentially grown.

And so on into the rain I walked. I walked alone, through a part of the city kids like me didn’t usually venture into. The darkness grew — both in the skies above me and deep, deep within me. You know what I mean for at one time or another, you have been there too. All light had gone out of the world. All hope had been drained away. Then the torrent came.

I’m not sure which soaked me more, the rain or the tears. I rarely cried as a boy — it was just hell if my older brother ever saw me crying — but the rain was making me shiver. I cannot ever forget that day. When I looked behind me in the dim darkness, someone was following me. A dark figure in a raincoat who stopped whenever I stopped. I tried to run, and when I did, he ran too.

There on the downtown city street, about a mile from the movie theatre, I came upon the imposing, looming spires of Saint Joseph Catholic Church. We didn’t spend much time in churches when I was growing up. The church’s dark brick façade and immensity seemed to stretch into the rumbling clouds. It felt almost as scary as “Invaders from Mars” and that ominous figure stalking somewhere behind me.

But the rain kept coming, and I had no choice. I climbed the steep marble steps of Saint Joseph Church, and just as I got to the top to duck into an alcove, a massive door opened next to me, and scared whatever wits I had left right out of me. It was, of all people, a police officer. I looked back down the street and the stalker had fled. “Get out of the rain, kid!” barked the officer as he shuffled me through the door on his way out. “And say a prayer for me while you’re in there,” he commanded. So in I went, almost against my will.

The church was massive. I had received my First Communion there two years earlier, but had never been back since. In the dim lights, I walked toward the sanctuary, and at the Communion rail, I knelt. I looked back toward the church doors, but no one had followed me in. I was alone, but a sense of safety slowly came over me. At some point it struck me that the police officer had come in here to pray and that thought impressed and comforted me. So I stayed for awhile.

Then I saw her! The great carved image in the sanctuary before me was crowned with light, and she held a child in her arms as though presenting Him to me. She was incredibly beautiful, but it was the creature beneath her feet that really gripped my attention and wouldn’t let it go. I stared in utter wonder at what was subdued beneath her feet. It was ugly, and all too real. It looked like the creature in the glass sphere that so terrified me in “Invaders from Mars.” It was trapped under her feet — under a soul that magnified the Lord.

Then the Martians left me. The stalker in the street left me. The missiles, and Khrushchev, and the Cold War left me. I felt, more than saw, the light come back into my world. The pulsing sobs, now still felt but unheard, left me, and a vista of hope broke through the clouds of doubt and fear. The look on her face was radiant, and she spoke to me. It wasn’t in words. It was deep, deep in the very place where fear had gripped my soul. I could not take my eyes from what was subdued beneath her feet. “Trust!” she said, and “Peace be with you.” And it was.

On that day she lifted me up out of a pit. Then years later, when once we met again, she humbled me, and I needed that, too. I tried to write about this in “Listen to Our Mother: Mary and the Fatima Century” but my words could not really ever do her justice.

Sixty-two years have passed since that day. Well over a half century. On the wall of this prison cell is an image of Saint Maximilian Kolbe, the patron saint of prisoners and writers and the patron of Beyond These Stone Walls and this imprisonment. He’s Pornchai Moontri’s patron, too, and this changed everything for him. Saint Maximilian’s feast day is August 14.

Next to him on our cell wall is that image, the one I saw at age nine. I don’t know where it came from. It appeared one day in a letter to Pornchai and went quickly up onto his wall. I wrote once of the images on our cell wall in “Angelic Justice: Saint Michael the Archangel and the Scales of Hesed.”

Reason for hope is a very great gift. Never again let the sun go down on your fear. When the Glorious Mysteries seem too unworldly to fathom, then look beneath her feet. What is there will look very familiar to you, and you will know what it means. The key to resisting evil is trust that the strife may not yet be over, but the battle is already won.

Remember, O most gracious Virgin Mary,
that never was it known
that anyone who fled to your protection,
implored your help
or sought your intercession,
was left unaided.
Inspired with this confidence,
I fly unto you,
O Virgin of virgins, my Mother;
to you do I come,
before you I stand,
sinful and sorrowful.
O Mother of the Word Incarnate,
despise not my petitions,
but in your mercy hear and answer them.
Amen.

— The Memorare, by Saint Bernard of Clairveaux

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Note from Father Gordon MacRae: Thank you for reading and sharing this post. You may also like these related posts from Beyond These Stone Walls:

How Our Lady of Fatima Saved a World in Crisis

The Assumption of Mary and the Assent of Saint Maximilian Kolbe

The Ark of the Covenant and the Mother of God

Advent of the Mother of God

The Eucharistic Adoration Chapel established by Saint Maximilian Kolbe was inaugurated at the outbreak of World War II. It was restored as a Chapel of Adoration in September, 2018, the commemoration of the date that the war began. It is now part of the World Center of Prayer for Peace. The live internet feed of the Adoration Chapel at Niepokalanow — sponsored by EWTN — was established just a few weeks before we discovered it and began to include in at Beyond These Stone Walls. Click “Watch on YouTube” in the lower left corner to see how many people around the world are present there with you. The number appears below the symbol for EWTN.

Click or tap here to proceed to the Adoration Chapel.

The following is a translation from the Polish in the image above: “Eighth Star in the Crown of Mary Queen of Peace” “Chapel of Perpetual Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament at Niepokalanow. World Center of Prayer for Peace.” “On September 1, 2018, the World Center of Prayer for Peace in Niepokalanow was opened. It would be difficult to find a more expressive reference to the need for constant prayer for peace than the anniversary of the outbreak of World War II.”

For the Catholic theology behind this image, visit my post, “The Ark of the Covenant and the Mother of God.”

Fr. Gordon J. MacRae 11/30/24 Fr. Gordon J. MacRae 11/30/24

Advent of the Mother of God

The Vigil of the First Sunday of Advent opens a time to release ourselves from the grip of Earthly powers to prepare the Way of the Lord and make straight His paths.

The First Sunday of Advent begins a time to release ourselves from the grip of Earthly powers to prepare the Way of the Lord and make straight His path.

Advent by Father Gordon MacRae

The Gospels According to Matthew and Luke are the Scriptural sources for the events of Advent and Christmas. They have many similarities and some differences. Matthew alone tells the story of the Magi, a story I unfolded here in “Upon a Midnight Not So Clear, Some Wise Men from the East Appear.” Only Luke has the story of Saint Gabriel the Archangel and the Annunciation. It seems that Mary herself was his source for that account and the events to follow. That Gospel passage graces two important Feast Days within Advent: The Solemnity of the Immaculate Conception on December 8, and the Feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe on December 12. I unfolded the deeper recesses of that account as well in “Saint Gabriel the Archangel: When the Dawn from On High Broke Upon Us.”

Both Evangelists often present two stories, one on the surface, and one with much deeper meaning and historical context for those “with eyes to see and ears to hear” making these accounts far richer stories with deeper significance. What lies beneath the lines of the Gospel has to be excavated by seeing and hearing with the hearts and minds of the original hearers of this Good News.

Saint Luke’s account of the Annunciation is followed immediately by Mary’s visit to her cousin Elizabeth who awaits the pending birth of John who would become known as the Baptist. It’s a short account, easy to read and ponder, but it tells two stories — maybe even three — one on its surface and one or two that lay beneath. I am going to reproduce it here:

“In those days Mary arose and went with haste into the hill country to a city of Judah, and she entered the house of Zechariah and greeted Elizabeth. And when Elizabeth heard the greeting of Mary, the child [who would become John the Baptist] leaped in her womb and Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit. She exclaimed with a loud cry, ‘Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb! And why is this granted to me, that the mother of my Lord should come to me? For behold, when the voice of your greeting came to my ears, the child in my womb leaped for joy. And blessed is she who believed that there would be a fulfillment of what was spoken to her from the Lord.”

— Luke 1:39-45

This account comprises the Second Joyful Mystery of the Rosary and is familiar to all of us. At face value, it relates a joyous encounter between Mary and Elizabeth, her cousin and the wife of Zechariah and expectant mother of John the Baptist.

Then there is a second level of meaning, though subtle, that astute Jewish hearers might detect in Luke’s account. The experience of the child leaping in Elizabeth’s womb in the presence of the prenatal Jesus recalls the Old Testament story of Rebekah (Genesis 25: 22-23), pregnant with the twins, Jacob and Esau. Both Luke’s Gospel and the Septuagint, the Greek translation of the Hebrew Scriptures, use the Greek word “skirtáō” to describe this “leaping” or “struggling” of the child in the womb.

In Saint Luke’s account, “the child leaped (skirtáō) in her womb” is used to infer that the child in Mary’s womb would be greater than his slightly older cousin, John (expressed in John 3:16 and 3:27-30). In the Old Testament case of Rebekah, it was to show that Jacob would have preeminence over his slightly older brother, Esau, as God Himself explains:

“The children struggled (skirtáō) together within her… And the Lord said to her, ‘Two nations are in your womb, and two peoples, born to you, shall be divided; the one shall be stronger than the other, the elder shall serve the younger.”

— Genesis 25: 22-23

Also, Elizabeth’s declaration, “Blessed are you among women,” reverberates in Jewish ears back to the experiences of Jael and Judith (Judges 5:24-27 and Judith 13:18). Blessed for their heroic courage in warding off the enemies hostile to Israel, Jael and Judith struck mortal blows to the head of the enemy. In Mary’s case, the victory will be even greater as she puts the head of the enemy beneath her feet (Genesis 3:15).

Elizabeth’s question put to Mary — “Why is this granted to me that the mother of my Lord should come to me?” — does not denote a simple visit between cousins. Every occurrence of “Lord” in this account and throughout this chapter in Luke (there are seven such references in this chapter) refer to God. Elizabeth’s declaration that Mary is the Mother of God (Theotokos, in the Greek) became the first Marian dogma to be expounded by the Church and defined, at the Council of Ephesus in A.D. 431.

Preceding these verses in Luke’s Gospel — and found nowhere else — is the beautiful account of the Archangel Gabriel’s Annunciation to Zechariah and then to Mary, and the very different ways the Archangel approaches them with Divine News. It demonstrates the great reverence and deference with which the Evangelist and early Church viewed Mary. It was a reverence that spilled over into art, as evidenced in the great painting “The Annunciation” by Fra Angelico.

The New Ark of the Covenant

And then there is yet another layer of meaning for keen Jewish ears in Saint Luke’s Visitation account. There are several striking parallels between Mary’s visit with Elizabeth and King David’s reaction to the return of the Ark of the Covenant to Jerusalem 1,000 years before. In Luke 1:39, Mary proceeds in haste “into the hill country to a city of Judah.” In the Second Book of Samuel (6:2) David arose and went to the very same place. In Luke 1:43, Elizabeth asks, how is it “that the mother of my Lord should come to me?” In Second Samuel 6:9, David asks, “How is it that the Ark of the Lord comes to me?” In Luke 1:41, “When Elizabeth heard the greeting of Mary, the child leaped in her womb…” In Second Samuel 6:16, “As the Ark of the Lord came into the City of David, Michal the daughter of Saul saw King David leaping and dancing before the Lord.”

The parallel is extremely important for the hearers of Luke’s words. The importance rests in the way the Ark of the Covenant was viewed by the people of God. It was a chest made of acacia wood — about 3.75 feet long and 1.5 feet wide (1.1 meters by 0.5 meters) lined both inside and outside with gold (Exodus 25:10-26). At its four corners were placed heavy rings of gold through which acacia poles could be slipped to carry the Ark since it could not be touched by human hands.

The lid was composed of a solid slab of gold that formed the “kapporet” or “mercy seat,” the place of atonement. It was surmounted by two solid gold cherubim which formed a throne so that the Ark itself became a footstool for God (Numbers 10: 33-35).

The Ark was built upon the command of God at Mount Sinai, and it housed the two stone tablets on which the Ten Commandments were inscribed. It also contained a golden vessel of manna (Exodus 16:34) and the rod of Aaron (Numbers 17:10). The Ark became the evidence of the Lord’s intimate association with Israel, a sign of the Covenant, and a housing for the Presence of God. When the Jews encamped, the Ark was placed in the Holy of Holies where Moses “conversed with the Lord” (Numbers 7:89).

During a struggle with the Philistines, the Ark was captured (1 Samuel 4:11) and taken. The Philistines suffered seven months of earthquakes and plagues (1 Samuel 5:3-9) until the Ark was returned. It stayed for twenty years at Kiriath-Jearim until that scene above in Second Samuel (6:16) when David leaped before it as it returned to the Tabernacle in Jerusalem.

The Ark remained there for the next 400 years until the fall of Jerusalem in 586 B.C. to the Babylonians (Jeremiah 3:16). It was not counted among the spoils claimed by the Babylonians but the Second Book of Maccabees (2 Macc 2-5) described that it was saved from destruction by the Prophet Jeremiah and hidden on Mount Nebo where it would stay “until God gathers His people together again and shows His mercy” (2 Macc 2:7).

Thus emerged throughout Israel the expectation of a Messiah, a Branch of David and a Son of God. In Saint Luke’s subtle but powerful short paragraph about the Visitation is found an entire nation’s wealth of understanding about the return of the Ark of the Covenant and the hope of a Messiah. In the subtle hand of Saint Luke, it is in Mary, the Theotokos, the God-bearer, the Ark of the New Covenant that the Dawn from On High broke upon us. Hers is a soul that magnifies the Lord.

The vision of the Ark in the Book of Revelation (11:19-12:1) hints at this identification: the “woman clothed with the sun” is the Mother of God. And she wants the last word. The door to that Word was opened on the Solemnity of her Immaculate Conception. The Word is “Mercy,” a divine Christmas gift, and it is the great tragedy of our age that so many do not even know they need it.

O Come, O Branch of Jesse’s stem;
From Every foe deliver them
That trust Your mighty power to save,
And give them victory over the grave.

O Come, O Key of David, come,
And open wide our heavenly home;
Make safe the way that sets us free,
And close the path to misery.

Rejoice! Rejoice! O Israel.
To thee shall come Emmanuel.

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Note from Father Gordon MacRae: Our regular weekly post will appear here on Wednesday. The above post was first published several years ago in an older version of this blog. Because of its popularity and focus on Advent, we have restored it and updated it substantially. You may note that some of the wonderful reader comments were posted on the original version of this post.

We have all been through a lot in the few three years. Advent is a time to correct our focus on all that really matters. For more Advent reading we recommend the following posts:

Saint Gabriel the Archangel: When the Dawn from On High Broke Upon Us

How Our Lady of Fatima Saved a World in Crisis

The Eucharistic Adoration Chapel established by Saint Maximilian Kolbe was inaugurated at the outbreak of World War II. It was restored as a Chapel of Adoration in September, 2018, the commemoration of the date that the war began. It is now part of the World Center of Prayer for Peace. The live internet feed of the Adoration Chapel at Niepokalanow — sponsored by EWTN — was established just a few weeks before we discovered it and began to include in at Beyond These Stone Walls. Click “Watch on YouTube” in the lower left corner to see how many people around the world are present there with you. The number appears below the symbol for EWTN.

Click or tap here to proceed to the Adoration Chapel.

For the Catholic theology behind this image, visit my post, “The Ark of the Covenant and the Mother of God.”

Fr. Gordon J. MacRae 11/20/24 Fr. Gordon J. MacRae 11/20/24

Thanksgiving in the Reign of Christ the King

While American tradition offers thanks in the land of the free and the home of the brave, some still await the promise of freedom with a bravery found in defiant hope.

While American tradition offers thanks in the land of the free and the home of the brave, some still await the promise of freedom with a bravery found in defiant hope.

November 20, 2024 by Father Gordon MacRae

Before celebrating Thanksgiving in America — even if you’re not in America — I will be asking the readers of Beyond These Stone Walls to ponder my post for next week. It has become a Thanksgiving tradition at this blog so I will post it anew on the day before Thanksgiving in America. Some readers have said that it has become a part of their own Thanksgiving observance. Its point is clear. Not everyone lives a privileged life. Not everyone even lives a life in freedom. But in the land of the free and the home of the brave, everyone can find reason to give thanks in the Reign of Christ the King.

The story next week’s post will tell is a true account of history that most other sources left in the footnotes. It is also a story that has deep meaning for us who have endured painful losses in this odyssey called life, the loss of loved ones, the loss of health, of happiness, of hope, the unjust loss of freedom. For some, the litany of loss can be long and painful, and it could drive us all into an annual major holiday depression.

It has helped me and those around me to consider the story of Squanto. History is too often passed down by victors alone. The story of the Mayflower Pilgrims who fled religious persecution (though they didn’t really) to endure the wilds of a brave new world (though they didn’t endure it without help) is well known. But it has been stripped of a far more accurate and inspiring story under its surface.

It is the story of Tisquantum, known to history as Squanto, the sole survivor of a place the indigenous called “The Dawn Land,” now known as Plymouth, Massachusetts. Having been chained up and taken on an odyssey of my own, I found very special meaning in the story of Squanto’s quiet but powerful impact on American history. So will you.

If you have followed our posts, then you know that a spirit of Thanksgiving has been elusive for us behind these stone walls. But with a little time and perspective, my friends here and I find that our list of all for which we give thanks has actually grown in size, scope, and clarity.

From the earliest days of BTSW since its inception in 2009, we have tried to live within a single core principle. I first discovered it in the classic book by Viktor Frankl, Man’s Search for Meaning (Beacon Press 1992). It promotes a fundamental truth about coping with life’s litany of loss with a central liberating theme: “The one freedom that can never be taken from us is the freedom to choose the person we will be in any circumstance.”

In Frankl’s own words, his story of survival in Auschwitz, the darkest of prisons, was in part inspired by the same person who inspires us. Saint Maximilian Kolbe was a prisoner, but he was first and foremost a Catholic priest who survived heroically by giving his life to save another. “Survived” might seem a strange word to use. Father Maximilian Kolbe was murdered, his earthly remains reduced to smoke and ash to drift in the skies above Auschwitz.

But he survives still. I am certain of this. The Nazi commandant whose power over others extinguished countless lives is now just a footnote on history. I don’t even know his name. But Saint Maximilian lives forever among the communion of saints. He lives in mysterious communion with us behind these stone walls with the same truth that inspired Victor Frankl to survive Auschwitz and write his own story of survival:

“We must never forget that we also find meaning in life even when confronted by a hopeless situation. For what then matters is to bear witness to the uniquely human potential to turn a personal tragedy into a triumph. When we are no longer able to change a situation … we are challenged to change ourselves.”

— Man’s Search for Meaning, p. 116

A friend recently sent me a revision of the famous “Serenity Prayer.” It struck me as an awesome truth and I reposted it a while back in another post, God, Grant Me Serenity. I’ll be Waiting. I find myself sharing this revised version often now with prisoners who come to me with a litany of grief and sorrow:

“God grant me Serenity to accept
the people I cannot change,
The Courage to change
the only one I can,
And the Wisdom to know
that it’s me.”

The Folly of Living with Resentment

One of the two patron saints who empower this blog is Saint Maximilian Kolbe. I have been very much informed by the course of his life in light of his sacrifices. Today my priesthood feels meaningless unless I don the glasses that Father Maximilian wore in prison. If I cannot see what he saw, then what I suffer is meaningless and empty.

But I have seen it. You may recall our post just a week ago, “Thailand’s Once-Lost Son Was Flag Bearer for the Asian Apostolic Congress.” You may have noticed the top graphic on that post. My friend, Pornchai Maximilian Moontri, was wearing a very special shirt sent to him in Thailand by one of our readers. It says “Without sacrifice there is no love.” The quote is attributed to Saint Maximilian Kolbe, and the shirt is emblazoned with his Auschwitz prison number, 16670. I told Max that if he puts this T-shirt on, he will never see his life and suffering the same way again. So I marvel at the fact that he not only put it on, but he wore it for all the world to see.

Sometimes readers write to ask me how it is that I am still (relatively?) sane after 30 years of unjust imprisonment with continually rising and then falling hope. They ask how it is that I still have faith, and why I do not seem to be bitter or resentful when I write. But I HAVE been bitter and resentful about the losses and sorrows life has tossed at me. It is just that I came to recognize that living in anger and resentment is like mixing a toxic brew for our enemies and then drinking it ourselves. It is to live in a self-imposed prison, a relentless assault upon your very soul.

Once you become ready to let go of bitterness and cease to be governed by resentment, faith and hope are what grow in its place. It is like a plant that springs up from a tiny crack in the urban concrete. You simply cannot hold onto your bitterness and your faith at the same time. One of them always gives way to the other.

I find lots of inspiration for this from the readers of this blog. Consider Fr William Graham of the Diocese of Duluth, Minnesota who spent eight years in exile, publicly shamed and his priestly ministry suspended. I wrote of his plight and its most recent development in “After Eight Years in Exile Fr William Graham Is Credibly Innocent.”

He had been falsely accused and cast out in 2016 after his bishop deemed a nearly 40-year-old claim against him to be “credible.” “Credible” is a vague and much abused term used in no other setting but American Catholic priesthood in the age of suspicion. As a legal standard, it means no more than the fact that a priest and an accuser lived in the same geographic area 30, 40, or 50 years ago. If an accusation “could have happened,” then it is seen by our bishops and their lawyers and insurers as “credible.”

After eight years in exile with a dark cloud of accusation hanging over his head, Father Graham was fully exonerated. He returned to ministry in the parish from which he was banished. He returned just in time to file his request for retirement and he moved on to a safer, quieter life with his priesthood intact. In spite of all that befell him, Father Graham believes that he has much to be thankful for. Throughout, Father Graham reported that he found both solace and hope in Beyond These Stone Walls, and it was a lantern during his darker times. Now he is free.

My Thanksgiving for Irony

And I am also thankful for the inspiration of irony. If you have been reading our posts all along, our stories are filled with it. Here’s a very moving example sent to me from a dear reader, the late Kathleen Riney. Kathleen was a retired nurse living in Texas. Her beloved husband, Tom, died from cancer, and Kathleen wrote that she found spiritual refuge in Beyond These Stone Walls.

Before her own death Kathleen wrote to me near the September 23 feast day of Saint Padre Pio, which is also the anniversary of my false imprisonment. I had written a post then that included the “Prayer after Communion” composed by Saint Padre Pio. I sent the post and prayer to Kathleen Riney who was caring for her dying husband at home.

Kathleen wrote that while her husband, Tom, was in the last weeks of his life, she gave him a copy of that prayer printed from that older post. The downloaded page had her name and email address at the top. She had rented a reclining hospital chair to help keep her husband comfortable. Many months after Tom died, Kathleen received this message in her email:

“Kathleen, my name is Kristine. I rented a hospital recliner. I found a paper with the “Stay With Me, Lord” prayer in the chair. I wanted to let you know that the prayer has helped me. I’m scheduled for surgery on November 1st and the surgery is the reason I rented the chair. Somehow that prayer found me and has strengthened me. I wanted to let you know that you touched a stranger in a great way!!! I will read it often. I hope all is well in your life. Thank you, Kristine.”

Accounts such as this are easy to dismiss as mere coincidence, but only if you really struggle to live life only on the surface without ever delving into what I recently called “the deep unseen” in the great Tapestry of God where our lives, through grace, become entangled with the Will of God. Padre Pio had many spiritual gifts in this life that I do not fully comprehend. I wonder if he ever thought that his “Prayer after Communion” would become like a message in a bottle cast into the sea where it would drift into the hands of someone known only to God. Here is that prayer in its entirety:

Padre Pio’s Prayer after Communion

Stay with me, Lord, for it is necessary to have You present so that I do not forget You. You know how easily I abandon You.

Stay with me, Lord, because I am weak and I need Your strength, that I may not fall so often.

Stay with me, Lord, for You are my life, and without You, I am without fervor.

Stay with me, Lord, for You are my light, and without You, I am in darkness.

Stay with me, Lord, to show me Your will.

Stay with me, Lord, so that I hear Your voice and follow You.

Stay with me, Lord, for I desire to love You very much, and always be in Your company.

Stay with me, Lord, if You wish me to be faithful to You.

Stay with me, Lord, for as poor as my soul is, I want it to be a place of consolation for You, a nest of love.

Stay with me, Jesus, for it is getting late and the day is coming to a close, and life passes; death, judgment, eternity approaches. It is necessary to renew my strength, so that I will not stop along the way and for that, I need You. It is getting late and death approaches. I fear the darkness, the temptations, the dryness, the cross, the sorrows. O how I need You, my Jesus, in this night of exile!

Stay with me tonight, Jesus, in life with all its dangers. I need You.

Let me recognize You as Your disciples did at the breaking of the bread, so that the Eucharistic Communion be the Light which disperses the darkness, the force which sustains me, the unique joy of my heart.

Stay with me, Lord, because at the hour of my death, I want to remain united to You, if not by communion, at least by grace and love.

Stay with me, Jesus, I do not ask for divine consolation, because I do not merit it, but the gift of Your Presence, oh yes, I ask this of You!

Stay with me, Lord, for it is You alone I look for, Your Love, Your Grace, Your Will, Your Heart, Your Spirit, because I love You and ask no other reward but to love You more and more.

With a firm love, I will love You with all my heart while on earth and continue to love You perfectly during all eternity.

Amen

This coming Sunday, the Sunday before Thanksgiving, the Church celebrates a most important Solemnity. Our politics consume all the press right now, and it is unavoidable. Only one truth is necessary this Thanksgiving. No matter who we elected president, Christ is our King!

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Note from Father Gordon MacRae: Whether we face the aftermath of our political struggles with sorrow or joy, our coming Thanksgiving requires a heart open to grace. Here are a few posts that I hope might light that lantern:

Four Hundred Years Since That First Thanksgiving

To Christ the King Through the Immaculate Heart of Mary

Saint Maximilian Kolbe and the Gift of Noble Defiance

With Padre Pio When the Worst That Could Happen Happens

Click or tap here to proceed to the Adoration Chapel.

For the Catholic theology behind this image, visit my post, “The Ark of the Covenant and the Mother of God.”

Fr. Gordon J. MacRae 11/13/24 Fr. Gordon J. MacRae 11/13/24

Thailand’s Once-Lost Son Was Flag Bearer for the Asian Apostolic Congress

In Cebu, Philippines Pornchai Max Moontri was flag bearer for the Kingdom of Thailand at the 5th Asian Apostolic Congress Pilgrimage of Hope in Divine Mercy.

In Cebu, Philippines Pornchai Max Moontri was flag bearer for the Kingdom of Thailand at the 5th Asian Apostolic Congress Pilgrimage of Hope in Divine Mercy.

November 13, 2024 by Fr Gordon MacRae

Many readers know that I earn $2.00 per day as the legal clerk in a prison law library. Among other tasks, I assist prisoners, many of whom are my friends, who faced deportation from the United States. Their destinations have so far included Brazil, Cambodia, China, Guatemala, Honduras, India, Indonesia, Japan, Laos, Mexico, Myanmar, Nepal, Thailand, and Vietnam. Despite the advice of Saint Padre Pio to “Pray, Hope, and Don’t Worry,” I have worried the most about my friend, Pornchai Max Moontri. He faced a nearly impossible assimilation to a country and culture he had neither seen nor been exposed to since he was taken from Thailand at age 11 in 1985.

Pornchai faced assimilation to Thailand after an absence of 36 years, 30 of them in a U.S. prison. I worried about his language barrier, about the absence of any family or material support, about the mountains of crushing discouragement that awaited him along this path. Readers of this blog may have seen a recent “Voices from Beyond” feature describing a project from an Arizona State University student who chose Beyond These Stone Walls as her thesis project in Ethnology, also known as Cultural Anthropology. Her project was motivated in part by interest, not so much in my story, but in Pornchai’s. It included an interview with Dilia E. Rodriguez, Ph.D., our editor who submitted her own perspective on Pornchai’s presence at this blog:

“Initially, I was struck by how many posts are about or mention Pornchai Moontri. After a while I came to think that their profound bond was like that of friends who endure the horrors of war together and survive. But now I think it is much more profound than that.

“God has inspired many truth seekers to investigate the case of Father MacRae, … but God wanted to reveal this with more than facts. He would reveal it with the powerful transformation of lives and souls. Pornchai had been viciously sexually and physically abused for years by a man who trafficked him from Thailand at the age of eleven and murdered his mother. Pornchai escaped and lived on the streets for all of his teen years. Then at age 18 he killed a man who tackled him and pinned him to the ground. After years of enduring violent sexual abuse this sent Pornchai into a rage.

“Having learned that Father Gordon MacRae had been convicted of sexual abuse, Pornchai should have wanted to stay as far away from him as possible. But Pornchai’s instinct told him otherwise. They became friends and Pornchai asked Father Gordon to be his cellmate for the next fifteen years until the time of his deportation to his native Thailand in 2020. In “Pornchai’s Story,” an article published by Catholic League President Bill Donohue, Pornchai described that Father Gordon ‘is my best friend and the person I trust most in this world.’

“While living with Father Gordon, Pornchai earned his high school diploma with honors and also pursued studies at Stratford Career Institute and in theology at Catholic Distance University. He was received into the Church on Divine Mercy Sunday in 2010, taking the name, ‘Maximilian’ as his Christian name in honor of Saint Maximilian Kolbe, a Patron Saint of Prisoners, Writers, Refugees, and Beyond These Stone Walls.” Back to Father Gordon ...

The 5th Asian Apostolic Congress on Mercy

From October 10 to 19, 2024, I was inspired to receive a steady stream of photos and videos sent to the tablet in the prison cell I once shared with Pornchai Max Moontri. From the far side of the world in Cagayan de Oro and Cebu City, Philippines the photos were sent to me by Max (he mostly goes by Max now) who was among the delegates from Divine Mercy Thailand at the 5th Asian Apostolic Congress on Mercy: Pilgrimage of Hope. The event drew some 5,000 pilgrims from ten Southeast Asian nations and others from around the world. As the photos came in, I was stunned at the sheer magnitude of this international event.

The first photos I received now form the collage above this section. They were taken when Max was chosen to present the flag of Thailand in procession at the opening ceremony of the Congress. Khun Yela Smit, Outreach Director of Divine Mercy Thailand, and Nithat Nawachartkosit its President asked Max to carry and present the flag of his homeland. The honor spoke volumes to my heart about how Divine Mercy can enter even the most wounded souls to connect with the mercy of God in hope for redemption and restorative justice.

The sight of Max standing before that immense crowd proudly holding the flag of his country brought tears to my eyes. In a photo from the AACOM website at the end of this post, you can see the face of Pornchai Max among delegates from other nations as he prepares for the procession to present his country’s flag.

Longtime readers of these pages already know the back story of Max’s life that our editor, Dilia E. Rodriguez summarized above. You can deduce from her words how steep a climb Pornchai’s path to Divine Mercy had been. Max says he was on this path because of me. I see signs that it was always the other way around. I have been on this path because God saw our lives long before we were even born. That is a difficult concept, but one magnified and embraced by Saint Maximilian Kolbe himself.

Just weeks before writing this, Jim Reilly, a reader from the Chicago area, sent me a series of newsletters from the National Shrine of St. Maximilian Kolbe. Among them was a profound message from our Patron Saint whose name Pornchai-Max chose as his own. St. Maximilian’s message quelled any lingering doubt I might have had about the Divine Mercy that binds us even from a world apart:

“For every human being on Earth, God has destined the fulfillment of a determined mission. Even from when He created the Universe, He directed causes so that the chain of effects would be unbroken, and conditions and circumstances for fulfillment of this mission would be most appropriate and fitting. Every individual is born with particular gifts and talents that are applicable to, and in keeping with, the assigned task. Throughout life the environment and circumstances so arrange themselves as to make possible the achievement of the goal and to facilitate its unfolding.”

— St. Maximilian Kolbe, “Prophet of the Civilization of Love”

I had to several times read that profound description of Actual Grace at work in our lives, across generations and even across millennia, before I could settle on the absolute truth of it. What Saint Maximilian wrote is mind-boggling, but now I live by it. Like Maximilian himself, I may even die by it.

I have been a priest for over 42 years, thirty of them in a Purgatory of unjust exile like Saint Maximilian himself. I call it “unjust” because, well, from every human standard it is. And yet I can see that it has not been without purpose — without God’s purpose, and I submit to it now with no further doubts. A few years ago, I was present at one of several Divine Mercy retreat programs offered in this prison by the Marian Fathers of the Immaculate Conception from the National Shrine of The Divine Mercy in Stockbridge, Massachusetts. I wrote several posts about these spiritual experiences, but one that stands out was in memory of the late Fr. Seraphim Michalenko. That post was “Divine Mercy in a Time of Spiritual Warfare.” What follows is an excerpt:

“In the 1970s, Fr. Seraphim Michalenko smuggled the Diary of St. Faustina out of Communist-occupied Poland. Over forty years later he smuggled Divine Mercy into a prison. Divine Mercy would one day become for me the framework of my very existence as a man, as a priest, as a prisoner.

“Fr Seraphim was appointed by the Vatican to be Vice-Postulator for the cause of canonization of Saint Faustina. Internationally known as an expert on her life and famous Diary, Father Seraphim was a catalyst for publishing it and documenting the miracles that became a basis for Faustina’s place among the Communion of Saints.

“Three years before his death in 2021, Father Seraphim was brought to this prison for a Mass. After Mass in the prison chapel, Max Moontri and I were both asked to remain because Father Seraphim wanted to speak with us. We both knew about him but had no idea that he knew about us. Max was nervous! ‘I don’t know what to say,’ he whispered to me. When Father Seraphim approached, he asked to speak with Max first. Fifteen minutes later, Max emerged smiling from a chapel office to tell me that I am next.

“As Father Seraphim and I spoke, he asked about our connection with St. Maximilian Kolbe, how he entered our lives, and how we came to Divine Mercy. In the telling, I mentioned my lifelong regard for a famous passage from St. John Henry Newman about how we are ‘links in a chain, bonds of connection between persons.’ I spoke of how this has guided me. I remember asking Father Seraphim how I could ever be certain of the 'definite service' God has committed to me that He has not committed to another. Father Seraphim leaned a little closer to me and whispered with quiet certainty as he pointed, ‘He is standing right over there.’ He was pointing to Pornchai-Max.”

— from “Divine Mercy in a Time of Spiritual Warfare”

In Cebu City : The Pilgrimage of Hope

On an Autumn evening back in 2014, my roommate, Max and I were summoned to the office of this prison’s chaplain, Catholic Deacon Jim Daly. He presented each of us with a book signed by its author, Felix Carroll from the National Shrine of The Divine Mercy. The book was a now well known Marian Press title, Loved , Lost, Found: 17 Divine Mercy Conversions. In Chapter 11, it contains the story of Max’s conversion. It being “Chapter 11” is itself highly symbolic.

Max suffered much in life, and he had to eventually come to terms with a hard truth. He had to accept his past life as bankrupt in order to start over on a path to seek and find God. Both our faces lit up as we turned that night to Chapter 11 in the book to see Max smiling while standing in the prison Chapel with Bishop John McCormack after having just been received into the Church. Bishop McCormack later told me that he had never before appeared in a photograph in any published book and was proud to now be so immortalized next to Max Moontri “whose sacred quest to learn trust stands as a monument to hope.” As we walked in the dark through the prison complex that night, Max turned to me holding up his book and asked, “How did this happen?”

When invited by Divine Mercy Thailand to the Philippines in October, Max arrived two days before the Asian Apostolic Congress on Mercy was scheduled to begin. The delegates from Divine Mercy Thailand who traveled together went first to the Diocese of Cagayan de Oro. There, in the city of El Salvador, Max was surprised to see in the sanctuary of the Basilica a mosaic of famous Divine Mercy saints. Some in the group asked Max to stand before the mosaic of Saint Maximilian Kolbe while others snapped his picture. If a picture speaks a thousand words, the one above speaks entire volumes.

Father Seraphim Michalenko once confirmed for me what I had already begun to suspect. Shortly after, the truth of it appeared in a 2014 issue of Marian Helper magazine in an article by Felix Carroll, “Mary Is at Work Here.” This is an excerpt:

“The Marians believe Mary chose this particular group of inmates to be the first [for Marian Consecration]. The reason eventually was revealed. It turns out that one of the participating inmates was Pornchai Moontri who was featured in last year’s Marian Press title, “Loved, Lost, Found:17 Divine Mercy Conversions.” Pornchai experienced a dramatic conversion in no small part due to a friendship he formed with fellow inmate — and now cellmate — Fr. Gordon MacRae who chronicles their lives in a celebrated website, BeyondTheseStoneWalls.com.”

That was when I began to pray. I do not just mean the recitation of the words of prayers. I mean “to pray,” from a heart opening to God its shades of darkness as well as its light. And it was for the first time in my life and priesthood. When (then) Blessed Faustina was to be beatified in 1993, one of the Marian priests who worked toward her canonization was Father Richard Drabik who was also my spiritual director in a spiritual renewal center for priests in which I worked in ministry. Fr. Richard’s Introduction to the Diary of Saint Faustina now graces its opening pages.

In my office one night, Father Drabik told me that he was leaving for Rome the next day for the Beatification of Saint Faustina. He asked me to write a personal petition that he would place on the altar at the Beatification Mass. I hastily wrote something spontaneous. I am told that the most efficacious prayer is that which wells up spontaneously from the heart and soul without forethought or rehearsal. My prayer, which I scribbled before sealing it in an envelope was, “I ask for the intercession of Saint Faustina that I may have the courage to be the priest God calls me to be.”

Be careful what you ask for! St. Faustina is now on the left of the Divine Mercy mosaic where Max Moontri stood, pictured above. Two weeks after writing that petition, I was arrested by the Gestapo and charged with the false claims that sent me to prison. Lawfare is outrageous, and it is also contagious. Wrongful imprisonment is the most arduous path I have ever been on. Over the next fifteen years, having been moved from one Purgatory to another, Pornchai Moontri showed up, a story we captured in “The Parable of a Priest and the Parable of a Prisoner.”

Four years before I began writing this, Pornchai-Max was deported to his native Thailand. In October 2024, he was invited by the group, Divine Mercy Thailand, to join them at the 5th Asian Apostolic Congress: Pilgrimage of Hope held in Cebu City, Philippines. Upon return from the Pilgrimage, Pornchai was also asked to take an active role in the group’s Thai apostolate beginning with the telling of his own powerful life story and conversion.

When I received the Pilgrimage brochure, I was surprised to see that among the presenters would be Father Joel de los Reyes from Barrigada in the Archdiocese of Agana, Guam, the very place where Pornchai’s mother was murdered, the most painful chapter in his life. Father Reyes’ address was entitled, “Mercy Shines in the Darkness of Our Life.” It was time for the healing of these memories. Other presenters from our more immediate past included Very Reverend Chris Alar, MIC, Provincial Superior of the Marians, and Fr Patrice Chocholski. Both are from the National Shrine of The Divine Mercy which played a major role in my priesthood, in Max’s conversion. Divine Mercy also became our summons to Consecration to Jesus through the Immaculate Heart of Mary which beats in our lives still.

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I invite you to visit a photo album from Pornchai’s pilgrimage by scrolling through the short videos and images below:

Click or tap here to proceed to the Adoration Chapel.

For the Catholic theology behind this image, visit my post, “The Ark of the Covenant and the Mother of God.”

Fr. Gordon J. MacRae 10/16/24 Fr. Gordon J. MacRae 10/16/24

In the Rearview Mirror: Tom Clancy and The Hunt for Red October

Tom Clancy passed from this life on October 1, 2013. A devout Catholic, he was a master of the military techno-thriller and a prophet of the World War III end times.

Tom Clancy passed from this life on October 1, 2013. A devout Catholic, he was a master of the military techno-thriller and a prophet of the World War III end times.

October 16, 2024 by Father Gordon MacRae

Hurricane season has prevented a new post at Beyond These Stone Walls in mid-October this year. I have heard from both helpers and readers in Florida, Georgia, North Carolina and other states greatly impacted by a hurricane season like no other in recent memory. The meteorological storms seems almost to reflect the winds of political discord as we face an uncertain future in the slowly unraveling United States. No matter the election outcome, or the winds of change it brings, “Jesus Christ is the same, yesterday, today and forever.” (Hebrews 13:8)

To write and publish a post each week, I am entirely dependent on a small number of kind and generous people who assist me with their time and talent. We have all learned to roll with the punches in these times, but in this stormy October one essential helper lost her phone, and another lost his home. Both are safe, thank God, but the combined impact for us this week is a rerun.

But it is no ordinary rerun. I wrote it eleven years ago this week to honor the life of an author and prophetic figure who taught me much of what I know about the political winds of this world. His first book, The Hunt for Red October, was published by the Naval Institute Press in 1984. I mentioned it in a recent post that a multitude of readers have since urged me to link to again. That post was “September 11, 2001, Freedom, Terrorism and Kamala Harris.” It serves as a diagram about threats posed by the Middle East, China, Russia, Iran, North Korea, and our current state of global unrest.

Over the course of two decades, Tom Clancy has educated me about how we got to where we are in global politics. In The Cardinal of the Kremlin, I learned of the seedbed of terrorism that was and now is again Afghanistan under Taliban control. Red Storm Rising, gave me a terrifying preview of World War III led by Russia and China, a war that must be prevented at all cost. In Patriot Games Northern Irish terrorism carried out atrocities agains the United Kingdom on both British and American soil.

In The Sum of all Fears, the middle East pursuit of nuclear weapons and nuclear war kept me up at night. In Red Rabbit, the Russian KGB link to an assassination attempt on the life of Pope John Paul II was exposed. Clear and Present Danger took me to the U.S. southern border and its infiltration by drug cartels and other criminal enterprises.

Then Debt of Honor and Executive Orders in a combined 1,600 pages, told the gripping story of Middle East Islamic jihad as a highjacked passenger jet was flying at high speed into the U.S. Capitol Building during a joint session of Congress. That account now hauntingly familiar, was told by Tom Clancy three years before the events of September 11, 2001 were conceived in Afghanistan by Osama bin Laden.

Finally, in 1,028 pages, The Bear and the Dragon in 2000, Clancy told another prescient story about the brink of World Wall III as China faced an economic crisis, while Russia struggled to regain the power and the glory of the former Soviet Empire. I read them all — some of them twice . Clancy wrote these stories with wide acclaim for the accuracy of his research. He wrote them to inform us about the risks and hazards of our engagement in geopolitics.

But the story I want to stand in for my post this week is none of the above. Another personal hero of mine, the late President Ronald Reagan, called this story “unputdownable!” The sun should not set on the month of October without paying respects to “Tom Clancy, Jack Ryan, and the Hunt for Red October.”

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Note from Father Gordon MacRae: Thank you for reading and sharing this post.

Click or tap here to proceed to the Adoration Chapel.

For the Catholic theology behind this image, visit my post, “The Ark of the Covenant and the Mother of God.”