Journeying With The Saints

Welcome, Catholic Pilgrims, to a beautiful day at sea with Mother Cabrini. In our reading for today, it is September 8th and that is the day that we celebrate Mary’s birthday. 

This got me thinking, “Why this day?” So, I went to look it up.

I found an answer at Catholic Answers which I'll read to you. 

With all that, let’s hear about Mary from Mother Cabrini by opening to page 244. 

Hello, Catholic Pilgrims, we are starting on a new voyage with Mother Cabrini. Two years have passed since her last voyage. This time she is leaving from Liverpool, that city made famous the Beatles. As you may know, all four Beatles' members were born and raised in Liverpool.

Mother Cabrini is going to tell us that this is her seventh time leaving Europe and before she goes, she has an audience with Pope Leo XIII. At the time of this recording, we just got our new pope, Pope Leo XIV. The St. Francis Cabrini Shrine in New York, recently posted these thoughts from a fellow Catholic:

"The last Pope Leo the world knew, sent a woman named Francesca X. Cabrini to the United States to care for the poor, hungry and marginalized. He sent her to bring them the hope of Jesus. That very woman died in the city of Chicago after being a missionary spreading the love of God, through the Sacred Heart of Jesus to those in need…May the new Pope Leo XIV from Chicago, who has been sent to Rome, also be a missionary spreading the love of God to all, because we are all in some need. Amen."

Those are some great connections for us to ponder as we turn to page 207 and begin our journey across the Atlantic.

Hello, Catholic Pilgrims, and welcome back. Today, we will read the second half of the letter for this voyage. Remember this is just one long letter for the Buenos Aires trip to Barcelona.

Since we will finish this letter today, I'll be giving my reflection once we are done.

Let's open to page 199 and start where it says, "We had no sooner left."

Welcome back, Catholic Pilgrims, to our next voyage. We are headed with Mother Cabrini from Buenos Aires, Argentina to Barcelona, Spain. We are about 8 months removed from the end of the last voyage, so the year is 1896.

This reading will be a bit different than other ones. This letter is just one long big letter and to read it all would take a good long while. So, we are going to split it up. We will read from page 189 to the middle of 199.

It's a longer reading, but we will get some info on what went on in Argentina, which will be insightful. So, this letter will take us just two days to work through and then that's it.

Without any further delay, let's open to page 189 and head to Barcelona.

Welcome back to the end of this voyage, Catholic Pilgrims. There is so much exciting stuff going on in today's reading. We've got mule rides over foggy mountains, jumps across deep chasms, drunken men, and scant food and sleep for Mother Cabrini and Mother Chiara. We are reading an adventure tale today that could totally be a movie.

We have a lot to read, but you are really going to be amazed at what a Religious Sister is willing to do to save souls.

Let's join her on the caravan by opening to page 176.

Welcome, Catholic Pilgrims. Today is a longer reading, but I invite you to sit back and just imagine Mother Cabrini traveling around off the coast of Chile. Her descriptions are really quite interesting. She's going to spend some time in Antofagasta and if you go look at the city online, you will find that, other than modern day buildings, her descriptions are very accurate.

She has some choice words to say about a Protestant pastor that is on board and, as a former Protestant, I don't blame her for her feelings on Protestantism. It has led millions away from the Eucharist and there's just no benefit in that at all.

Since this is a longer reading, let's go ahead and get started by turning to page 168.

Hello, Catholic Pilgrims. Welcome back. Today, we are going to get a major geography lesson.

I used to be horrible at geography—horrible. Once I became a military spouse, I started to get better, mostly because I was traveling a lot and I started really looking things up on a map and caring about what I was looking at.

I imagine that most of us listening to this book have not traveled down the west coast of South America. As Mother describes it, it sounds very, very different than what most of us are used to environmentally and geographically.

So, let's settle in and hear about that part of the world through a missionary's eyes by turning to page 165.

Welcome, Catholic Pilgrims. We have a long reading today filled with all kinds of good information and descriptions. Even though it's a longer reading, I think you are really going to enjoy hearing about Mother being in Peru.

Since, it will take more time to get through, let's go ahead and get started by turning to page 158.

Welcome, Catholic Pilgrims, to another day at port near Peru with Mother Cabrini.

You can kind of imagine the first 3/4 of today's reading a bit of a blog almost. Mother is describing what life at port in Peru in the late 1800s is like and it's a real snapshot in time for us. She even talks about seagull guano today, which I never would have thought a Saint would discuss.

In the last part of the reading, she talks about obedience. As I've said before, obedience is one of the dirtiest words in our culture. Too many only want to be obedient to themselves and that's a huge problem. As we can see when we look around.

Welcome, Catholic Pilgrims.

Today, we are with Mother Cabrini at the port of Piata in Peru. She is going to describe it as looking very desolate and it seems not much has changed. If you go look on google maps, it is a brown, dry desert. There is not much color.

The word Piata is not a Spanish word, at least not that I could find. So, I don't know exactly what it means, but there is a port of Piata, so maybe it's just a name.

Let's hear about Mother Cabrini's time now in Peru by turning to page 153.