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RC DAILY MEDITATIONS
RC DAILY MEDITATIONS

August 22, 2024

Regnum Christi Spirituality Center Uncle Eddy

The Queenship of Mary

/ Uncle Eddy

Dear Regina,

Am I wrong, or have you been reading Harlequin Romances again?  You gave yourself away in your last email – to say that you are “positively and passionately convinced” that God wants you to find a boyfriend this year, that you “feel surging through your veins and your very soul a deep spiritual yearning for intimate romantic companionship”, to say such things is, well, a bit extreme.  Don’t get me wrong, we are all made for love, and the restlessness in our hearts is, ultimately, directed to fulfilling that vocation. But seeking romance for romance’s sake is a dangerous approach to life on campus. It’s kind of like putting the cart before the horse, as they say. Today’s Memorial of the Queenship of Mary explains why.

Today’s memorial, which lifts the minds and hearts of all Christians to heaven, where we behold our Everlasting Lord enthroned in glory, and beside him his Mother Mary, assumed body and soul into heaven (we celebrated that even seven days ago – I’m sure you remember, because the Assumption is holy day of obligation, so you certainly went to Mass…), sharing in his rule by extending her motherly solicitude to all his brothers and sisters.  It is to Christ’s glory that he has given Mary an exceptional role in the establishment of his Kingdom.

Anyway, enough beautiful abstractions.  The point is that as a Christian, you have been given in Mary a model of perfect womanhood that non-Christians simply don’t have.  It is hard for them to see how they should direct their innate yearnings for intimacy, for love, for self-giving. This instinct is naturally linked to sexual desire, and the potent mix is called “romance”.  But the wisdom you have received as a Christian reminds you that original sin upset the natural order of our desires, especially the most powerful ones – like the inclination to love and sexual desire. So you can’t just let these fallen natural desires have their sway.  You must master them and put them in order, otherwise they will master you, and you will become their slave.

If you put all the power of your love first of all at the service of Christ, then he will guide you to the wildly satisfying fulfillment of all your desires, much more so than if you tried to design heaven by yourself, without him.  This is Mary’s lesson for us. Her motto was, “Let it be done unto me according to your word,” a motto she followed perfectly her whole life long. And look how she was rewarded! Not only does her purity and virginity shine like the sun over the entire moral universe, but her motherhood is the most fruitful in the history of the human race!  That’s what happens when we follow Christ and submit our plans and hopes to him – our most glorious dreams are far surpassed by his infinite wisdom and unlimited power.

So don’t set your sights on romance, as if that alone would satisfy the longings of your heart; set your sights on Christ and his Kingdom, after all, he’s the greatest matchmaker the world has ever known.

Your loving uncle, Eddy

The Queenship of Mary Read More »

The Pilgrimage of Ordinary Time

/ Blog, Regnum Christi News, Weekly Message Blog

As the sacrament coordinator at Christ the King Parish in Regina, I have the great pleasure of welcoming dozens of new babies and children into the Church community through the sacrament of baptism every year and, along with that, meeting new parents, some of whom are making their way back to the Church after some time away. The faith journeys of these new parents are each unique – the detours they took along the way, the paths that brought them back – but there is a common theme that runs through not all, but most, of the stories they tell when I ask them why they have chosen to have their child baptized, often after spending years away from the sacraments themselves. Usually, it’s the faith habits of their childhood – and their own experience of receiving the sacraments and wanting the same for their children – that draws new parents back to the Church.

But when I invite new parents to share some of those memories of faith life in their childhood, oddly enough, the family traditions of Christmas and Easter seldom come up. People rarely mention Advent wreaths, Lenten fasts, Christmas Eve Mass, or Easter Vigil. Instead, it’s the regular, ordinary moments and traditions that these new parents tend to remember – weekly Mass as a family, grace around the supper table, Bible stories read at bedtime, the rhythm of the rosary prayed in the evening. It is these simple faith moments and habits that new parents long to recreate in their own families, and baptizing their child is often their first step on this reclaimed path back to living out the Catholic faith in their home. And there is no better time in the liturgical year to build the habit of a living faith than Ordinary Time.

Ordinary Time is time along the journey to put your head down and make up some ground. In the ordinariness of it all (no weeks-long seasons of preparation leading up to giant feast days), we get to build habits, doing over and over, for a season at a time, the same things until they become routine. And in the habitualness of it, we get to cover real territory in our spiritual journey, establishing a regular prayer life, building virtue, and developing a habit of hope that can support us through the valleys on our journey ahead.

Read the rest of the article, including three things we can do during Ordinary Time to build faith habits that can carry us through the inevitable highs and lows of the spiritual life here.

The Pilgrimage of Ordinary Time Read More »

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Alex Kucera

Atlanta

Alex Kucera has lived in Atlanta, GA, for the last 46 years. He is one of 9 children, married to his wife Karmen, and has 3 girls, one grandson, and a granddaughter on the way. Alex joined Regnum Christi in 2007. Out of the gate, he joined the Helping Hands Medical Missions apostolate and is still participating today with the Ghana Friendship Mission.

In 2009, Alex was asked to be the Atlanta RC Renewal Coordinator for the Atlanta Locality to help the RC members with the RC renewal process. Alex became a Group Leader in 2012 for four of the Atlanta Men’s Section Teams and continues today. Running in parallel, in 2013, Alex became a Team Leader and shepherded a large team of good men.

Alex was honored to be the Atlanta Mission Coordinator between 2010 to 2022 (12 years), coordinating 5-8 Holy Week Mission teams across Georgia. He also created and coordinated missions at a parish in Athens, GA, for 9 years. Alex continues to coordinate Holy Week Missions, Advent Missions, and Monthly missions at Good Shepherd Catholic Church in Cumming, GA.

From 2016 to 2022, Alex also served as the Men’s Section Assistant in Atlanta. He loved working with the Men’s Section Director, the Legionaries, Consecrated, and Women’s Section leadership teams.

Alex is exceptionally grateful to the Legionaries, Consecrated, and many RC members who he’s journeyed shoulder to shoulder, growing his relationship with Christ and others along the way. He knows that there is only one way, that’s Christ’s Way, with others!