Ratisbone’s Conversion From Jew To Traditional Catholic

Its impossible not love our Lady and not become a devout Catholic that is on fire for the conversion of souls.  Please read the moving story about Alfonso Ratisbone’s conversion from a Jew to Catholic because of the Miraculous Medal.

———————————————————————————————-

http://www.traditionalcatholicpriest.com/2015/06/09/ratisbones-conversion-from-jew-to-traditional-catholic/ Ratisbone’s Conversion From Jew To Traditional Catholic

Alfonso Ratisbone’s Conversion  Alfonso Ratisbone was a lawyer and banker, a Jew of 27 years of age. He hated the Catholics because his brother Theodore had converted and became a priest, he had as a logo the miraculous medal and fought for the conversion of the Jews.

On January of 1842 on a tourist trip to Naples and Malta, there was a mistake made in the route and Alfonso arrived in Rome instead. Here he had the obligation of visiting a friend of the family, the Baron Theodore de Bussiere, a protestant converted to Catholicism.

The Baron received him with cordiality and offered to show him around Rome. In a meeting where Ratisbone spoke horrors about Catholics, the Baron heard him with much patience and finally said: “Well since you are so sure of self, promise me you will carry with you what I’m going to give you.” “What is it?”,  his miraculous medal. Alfonso rejected the medal indignant and the Baron replied: “According to your ideas, to accept the medal should leave you indifferent. But on the other hand it pleases me”. Ratisbone smiled, put on the medal and said that he was not a fool.  The Baron also asked Him to pray the Memorare which he did.

Later on the thee Baron requested prayers from several people, among them the Count of La Ferronays, saying to him: “I put the Miraculous Medal on him and made him pray the Memorare, I’m sure he will convert.”  The Count of La Ferronays died suddenly two days later. It was known that he had gone on the two previous days to the Basilica of St. Mary Mayor to pray 100 Memorares for the conversion of Ratisbone.

The Baron meets with Ratisbone around the Spanish Square in his last day in Rome and invites him for a trip around the city. But first he had to go to the Church of St. Andres to arrange the funeral for the Count. Ratisbone also goes in the Church.  Then a miracle occurs, he relates in his own words: “Within a few moments of entering the Church, I felt dominated by an unexplainable confusion. I raised my eyes and thought the entire building was disappearing before my eyes. One of the chapels (the chapel of St. Michael ) was covered with light, and in the midst of this splendor appeared the Blessed Virgin Mary, radiantly and and full of majesty and sweetness. She appeared as She was in the medal. An irresistible force drew me to the Chapel.  Then the Blessed Virgin gave me a signal with her hand, as if telling me to kneel, and when I did, it seemed by the aspect of her face she was telling me: ‘Well . . . .’ The Virgin didn’t speak to me, but I understood it all.“

The Baron finds him kneeling, crying and praying with his hands together, and kissing the medal. Shortly after he is baptized in the Gesu Church in Rome. By order of the Pope, the canonical process begins and it is declared “true miracle“.

Alfonso Ratisbone entered the Company of Jesus and was ordained a priest. He was sent to Paris to help his brother Theodore in the catechumens for the conversion of the Jews. After being a Jesuit for 10 years, with permission he leaves the order and founds in 1848 the religious community of Our Lady of Sion and the Missions of Our Lady of Sion. In only the first 10 years Ratisbone obtained the conversion of 200 Jews and 32 Protestants. Father Alfonso Ratisbone worked hard in Holy Land, and was able to purchase Pilate’s old house, converted into a convent and church for the religious. He also made it possible for the religious to found a hospital in Ain-Karim, where he died a holy death in 1884 at age 70.  Pierced Hearts.org

Catholicism is the Truth. Here is Further Evidence.

Thank God for the Catholic faith and the peace it provides to us humans as we traverse this valley of tears. The story below of an event in American history shows how the truths of the Catholic Church are meant to be known by all races and shared by all race. As it states in the story below, we know that “truth does not change; it is only forgotten from one generation to the next.” Our generation has sadly lost the knowledge of this truth. We have to bring it back to society brick by brick.

——————————————————————-

http://catholicexchange.com/new-light-tragic-tale-american-history

A New Light on a Tragic Tale in American History

Dale Ahlquist

A friend once lent me a book that I wish everyone else could read. Unfortunately it is not readily available. In fact, it has been out of print for almost 120 years. It is the memoir of Monsignor Augustin Ravoux, who served as a priest in Minnesota before the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis even existed. It is an inspiring and thrilling account of the trials and triumphs of a remarkable priest, who was born in France in 1815, and found himself assigned to Mendota in 1842. His “little flock” was spread along the Mississippi and St. Croix rivers. They spoke English, French, Sioux and Chippewa. He worked with Fr. Galtier who had built the first chapel in St. Paul in 1841. He welcomed the first bishop of St. Paul, Joseph Cretin, in 1851, and upon Bishop Cretin’s death in 1857, he was the administrator for the diocese until the next bishop was appointed, and he assisted in the building of Minnesota’s first Cathedral.

Msgr Augustin Ravoux

He describes his life as a frontier priest with rich understatement: “Though ever pleased with the mission entrusted to my care by Divine Providence, the path I had to walk in was not always strewn with flowers.” Msgr. Ravoux faced difficulties we cannot imagine. There were no developed roads, and he nearly drowned in the Mississippi on a trip to Dubuque, and nearly died of thirst crossing the prairies to Ft. Pierre. In the early years, the Chippewa and the Sioux were at war with each other, and Msgr. Ravoux had to find a way to minister to both tribes without alienating the other. He witnessed firsthand, the horrific tortures that the Sioux inflicted on their own people as part of their native religious practices, and worked hard to convince them that these practices were truly evil, including a few instances of human sacrifice. The Sioux for the most part were not very responsive to his missionary efforts.

On the other hand, some things he talks about sound very familiar: teaching and defending the Catholic faith among “atheists, infidels, Protestants, and bad Catholics.” His arguments about faith and reason, the Catholic foundation of Scripture, the intercessory powers of Mary and the saints sound no different from those we use today. Truth does not change; it is only forgotten from one generation to the next.

The most fascinating episode in the book, however, is an account of an infamous historical event – but with a surprising perspective that I certainly never learned in school.

On December 26, 1862, the largest mass execution in the history of the United States took place in Mankato. 38 Sioux were hanged for brutally murdering white settlers during the Dakota Sioux Uprising earlier that year. The Sioux had killed almost 800 settlers in an attempt to drive the rest of them out of the Minnesota territory. While controversy continues to swirl around both the causes of the uprising and the subsequent events, there was one thing I never knew until I read this book:  33 of the 38 men who were executed had been received into the Catholic Church the day before. The priest who baptized them was Msgr. Ravoux.

When the Sioux were given their death sentence, the colonel at the prison told them to choose the spiritual adviser they thought fit. They could follow their own native rituals in preparing for death, or seek out the two Protestant ministers who were present or the one Catholic priest, Father Ravoux. The two Protestant ministers knew the Sioux language perfectly, having ministered among them steadily for 25 years, whereas it had been 18 years since Msgr. Ravoux had last devoted any missionary effort to the Sioux, with whom he had never experienced much success. And since there were so few priests in the area, he had spent all of his recent years serving the Catholic settlers.

To his and everyone else’s surprise, all but five of the condemned men chose the “black robe” (as Catholic priests were known).  Msgr. Ravoux then spent the next four days with them instructing them in the essentials of the Catholic faith: creation, the Fall, the Trinity, the Incarnation, the redemption of the world through the Cross, Heaven, Hell, Death, Judgment. They learned the sign of the Cross, the Apostle’s Creed, the Our Father, the Hail Mary, the Act of Contrition. “The piety with which they followed these exercises filled my heart with consolation,” writes Msgr. Ravoux. “I can say without hesitation that divine grace overflowed their souls; for it alone could have wrought such a change.” This pioneer priest, who had experienced much death and suffering and hardship in his time, was no soft touch, but he was deeply moved by the transformation he witnessed in these men. It was all he could do to maintain his composure when he ministered to them; but when he was alone “the tears flowed abundantly from my eyes.”

Three of the Sioux had chosen to be baptized as Presbyterians, and only two retained their native beliefs. The newly baptized Catholics spent their last night on earth sleeping peacefully. Those who clung to their traditional religion paced the floor in nervous agony till dawn. In the morning, Msgr. Ravoux spent a final hour of prayer with the 33 new Catholics (whom he also called his “little flock”), then he watched them mount the scaffold without any sign of fear, “without a murmur of resistance…animated with great hope for the future.”

Interestingly enough, the horrible event opened a door for Msgr. Ravoux that had previously been closed. It turned out that the condemned Sioux had gotten the word out to their friends and relatives to follow their example and embrace “the religion of the black robe.” A year after the execution, some 300 Sioux families were encamped around Ft. Snelling. Father Ravoux was welcomed into the encampment, and visited often. Almost 200 individuals were eventually baptized.

We never know how God can use a tragedy for the Kingdom of Heaven, but we should always be prepared, no matter what.