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The Simple Truth, rising up to explore the difficult topics of real life.
Join us as we proclaim the good, the true, and the beautiful with the simple truth of
Jesus Christ and his holy Catholic Church through scripture, tradition, and the catechism.
And now, your host, Jim Haigens.
It is great to be back with you on The Simple Truth.
We consecrate everything to this day.
Sacred Heart of Jesus, through the Immaculate Heart of Mary and the Pure Strong Heart of
Saint Joseph. Today is Testimony Tuesday, where we bring you real, live, first-hand
testimonial accounts of the life-giving reality of Jesus and his Catholic Church. Our guest
today is Fr. Fidelis Moscinski of the Catholic Church.
of the Franciscan Friars of the Renewal, the CFRs.
He's been a part of the rescue mission
within the pro-life movement since 1989.
For the past four years, that has taken the form
of what is called Red Rose Rescue.
You can learn more about it at redroserescue.com
or the Red Rose Rescue Facebook page.
But he's here to share his personal testimony,
some of his personal testimony with us today.
Come Holy Spirit.
Father Fidelis, thank you for being with us.
How are you today?
You're welcome Jim. Yeah, very good. Thank you
Good. Well, we always begin with the beginning. We start with childhood. So what was your
early life like, your family, the culture that you grew up in?
So, up in New Jersey, a place called Port Redding, and I was baptized a Catholic, and
My family, we always practiced our faith.
We went to church every Sunday.
In fact, eventually my father became a permanent deacon
in the Diocese of Metuchen.
I have two younger sisters
and attended public school until seventh grade
and I entered Catholic school, Catholic high school.
you know, pretty much a normal upbringing, good family life, and it was a sign of really God's
providence, you know, forming me and guiding me from my early days, and I'm very grateful for it.
At what point would you say you remember really understanding that Jesus was real, right?
That this is really God who has come to us and he's inviting us into this life with him
and that the Catholic faith was real.
Was that simultaneous all at once or was it in stages?
What do you recall?
Yeah, I remember one particular moment.
There was a retreat that I attended when I was I think maybe in eighth or ninth grade
and it was in the parish.
The talk that the person was presenting was about Jesus, and then we had some time for reflection afterwards.
And I think it was the first time that I began to ask myself, like, why am I Catholic?
And it's interesting.
I was thinking, am I here at this retreat identifying myself as a Catholic, simply because
my parents are Catholic and that's the way they raised me.
Or do I choose it for myself?
And it's interesting that that was the first time I had to kind of grapple with that question.
And I went to speak to a priest about it and he says well now is the time you have to choose whether you believe in Jesus or you're just going to be kind of having a kind of a cultural Catholicism just because it's in your family.
And thanks be to God and his grace I did choose to believe personally in Christ.
The way I kind of look back on it and describe it to myself and to other people, it's like
when a child is going to go outside and it's maybe rainy and wet and the mother puts a
raincoat on the child.
to keep the child dry and in some sense you know our parents hand on the faith to us
especially for example having us baptized as infants and then
having us, you know, become catechized in the church. And that raincoat is kind of representative
of the faith that's handed on to us. But at a certain point, the child needs to make that
decision of faith for themselves personally. And in a sense, the raincoat has to become like
their very skin.
it has to become part of them. They have to choose it. And so that was a significant
point for me on that retreat and I'm grateful that I did make that choice because it's made
obviously all the difference in the world in my life.
Praise God. So resulting from that, how did things change? What was life like? How was
it different, I guess, navigating through your high school years, especially with probably
a lot of peers, even within a Catholic school, that weren't making that same choice. Normally,
we think it's going to be different.
some persecution when we step out and say we're going to really follow Jesus
with all that we've got. So what was it like for you? What was the experience?
Yeah, I would say, at least in high school, there wasn't that much of a change.
I mean, I had a good, close group of friends and we all believed and lived the same way.
So I was an altar boy and I was involved in the youth group and different retreats and
practicing my faith.
I would say the real challenge...
came when I went to college and I went to Rutgers University in New Brunswick, a very
big state school and as you can imagine all kinds of perspectives and groups of people
and at that point
realized that it wasn't simply enough to have a kind of a personal faith but
that I had to live that faith externally with other people and thankfully at that
time there was a very good campus ministry going on there were some
Dominicans there and I continued going to Mass and I suppose that the thing
that really was a catalyst for me
was I joined the Pro-Life group on campus, which I just started.
This was in...
1987 and we started to get involved in kind of pro-life activism and with
Operation Rescue at that time. And so that's when, you know, when you say
I'm Catholic and I'm pro-life and you start living that publicly, that's when
the opposition comes.
Yes, and what was it, what do you remember specifically about that moment of saying yes,
not just to sharing the life of Christ that He was offering you, but also in sharing that
mission specifically in this way within the pro-life movement, what was it that convicted
you?
It was a very specific moment, Jim.
We had one of our speaker come into our meetings on the Pro-Life Group on campus and he showed
the video, the silent scream, and it depicted what happens with an abortion and how the
child is killed.
And I think at that point, I was intellectually pro-life.
I would defend the pro-life position, but seeing what actually happens to the child
when it's being killed through an abortion, that really convicted my heart.
The first thought was simply, how is this possible?
How can this be happening in our country?
And so little is being done to stop it.
And then, so from that point, I said, well, whatever I can do,
I started looking for ways to get more active.
And that's when I started to join with the Operation Rescue,
where people would go and sit down peacefully
in front of the doors of the abortion clinic
and basically put themselves between
the child and the knife of the abortionist and so I did a number of
rescues while I was in college and in fact there was one in
In 1990, in Dobbs Ferry, New York, there were a group of us who were arrested, and I was
in jail for about two months, so I had to drop out of college at that point.
I subsequently went back and finished and got my degree, but kind of the turning point
was
Prayer became very, very real and very essential, very important.
Up until that point
I gave God maybe 45 minutes or an hour on Sundays and then the whole rest of the week
was for me for whatever I wanted to do and that was wrong and when I was first arrested
and you know you're being driven away and the situation at that point is completely
outside your control, your
You don't know where you're going, what's going to happen, what are the consequences,
and so then, that's when prayer, you know, really becomes important.
And for me, that was a real turning point when I began to ask the Lord, you know, what
is...
What is my life about? What do you want me to do? How do you want me to live?
What's my vocation? And so thankfully things kind of really fell into place after that
and he showed me where he wanted me to go and I've been trying to follow him haltingly ever since.
When we get back, we're going to pick up right there with Father Fidelis, but as we go into
the break, maybe spend some time in prayer during this quick break, ask God for greater
ongoing conversion or perhaps an initial
conversion if that's where you're at. Remember these words from St. John Marie
Vianney, the Curie de Arz, right? He says, if you really asked him,
ask God for conversion, it would be given to you. If you really ask Jesus for
conversion, it would be given to you. If you really ask Mary for conversion, it
would be given to you. So let us pray for that. Grant us greater conversions, Lord.
We'll be right back. Stay tuned.
This is Franciscan Media's Saint of the Day for November 30th.
Today we celebrate Saint Andrew.
The Gospels give us little information about today's Saint.
We know that he was the brother of Peter and that the two of them, both fishermen, left
their nets behind to follow Jesus.
We learn that from Matthew's account.
In John's Gospel, we learn that before the multiplication of the loaves, it was Andrew
who spoke up about the boy who had the barley loaves and fishes.
Today's saint seems to have been something of a leader among the Apostles.
His name is regularly given prominence among them.
Legend has it that Andrew preached the good news in what is now Greece and
Turkey, and that he was crucified in Greece. There are some accounts of his
death on an X-shaped cross, now known as St. Andrew's Cross. While we know little
about the holiness of Andrew, Peter and John tend to fare best among the
followers of Jesus,
It is enough to know that he was an apostle.
He was called personally by Jesus to proclaim the good news, to heal with Jesus' power,
and to share his life and death.
There's more about the saints along with inspiration and Catholic resources at our website, saintoftheday.org.
From Franciscan Media, this has been Saint of the Day.
This is Jesuit Father Robert McTague, your dearly host of The Catholic Current.
Join me on Wednesday at 5 p.m. Eastern when we welcome back Charles Vain Lehman of the Manhattan Institute.
I'm going to ask him, is going woke good for business? I think his answer may surprise you.
Listen to it all on The Catholic Current on Wednesday at 5 p.m. Eastern,
coming to you from the Station of the Cross and the iCatholic Radio Mobile app.
Welcome back to The Simple Truth, Jim Havens here with our guest today, Father
Fidelis Moschinski of the CFR. He has been a part of the rescue movement
within the pro-life movement since 1989. He was sharing about that with us in the
first segment, how he got involved in college and that leads us up to the
Lord was pulling you deeper not just into the pro-life movement in that way
but also deeper into his own heart, deeper into a life.
of prayer deeper into a discernment of your vocation.
Share with us more about that,
about discernment of vocation.
What was that experience like for you?
Right, so I remember after that rescue we did in 1990 in Dobbs Ferry, New York, somebody
sent into the jail some books that we shared among each other, and one of those books was
called The Reform of Renewal, written by Father Benedict Rochelle, and it was about religious
life, about Franciscan life.
And so at that point I saw the book and on the back cover there was a picture of the community at the time.
And I basically said, well, either I'm going to do rescue for the rest of my life, or maybe
I'll join this group.
And so when I was, after I was released, I started to read a book.
the life of St. Francis and I was very touched by his relationship with Jesus
it was so real
It just consumed his whole life and I began to ask myself, well, you know, was that just unique for Francis or is that kind of relationship with Jesus, you know, open to other people, like even me?
And by God's grace, I was asking that question
and I received the answer, yes, it is possible.
That's what the Lord wants for all of us,
that Jesus would be the Lord, the focus, the center,
the everything of all of our lives.
and so that's what St. Francis showed me and and then growing with that there
was a real a kind of an awareness the Lord gave me that I already belonged to
him.
It wasn't about so much me choosing him, but he had already chosen me, and I needed
to acknowledge that and make that real by the choices that I've made in life.
So, for me, that took on the conviction that I needed to become a religious and make the
vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience.
And it was understood in terms of, you know, Jesus sacrificed everything for me.
There's no way I can live my life unless I also sacrifice everything for him and give
it all back to him.
And the form that that took for me was to take my vows as a Franciscan poverty.
chastity and obedience. So I ended up writing a letter to the author of that book Father Benedict
and he invited me to come visit and
There was an event here in the Bronx,
which is where our community started.
One of the brothers was making his first vows.
So there was a mass and some,
my dad and I came here to New York to attend the mass
and the little reception afterwards.
And I got to meet all the friars,
had a wonderful time.
And then with Joel's back home,
And we pull up in front of the house and I stayed in the car, I worked this out with dad and dad went inside and spoke to mom and he says to her, well, I left him there because he's going to join.
And of course, you know, that was, it was kind of obviously was a joke, but it was, it was serious in the sense that at that point, I really did want to join the friars and.
I went back, I finished another year at college and then the following September I entered
as a postulant.
And what role did the sacramental life play in all of this?
What was specifically confession, the sacrament of penance, and the Holy Eucharist?
What was your life like in terms of just entering into the sacramental life?
And how was our Lord blessing you in that way?
Right. So, thanks be to God. I was always receiving the sacraments frequently.
I probably could have been going to confession
a little bit more frequently than I was,
but it was enough just barely.
The thing, however, that I kind of point to
as making a big difference spiritually for me,
at a certain point, I came across the writings
of St. Louis de Montfort and his true devotion to Mary.
And I started praying the rosary regularly and I made the consecration of myself to the
Blessed Virgin Mary according to the devotion that he writes about.
That made an enormous difference for me particularly with regard to dealing with
temptation and living a life of virtue. Previously it was really hard and it
never became super easy but I just recognized you know those critical
moments when you need to make a decision.
to go left or right with regard to sin or virtue. After the consecration and with the frequent
praying of the rosary, I just found it easier for me to make that right choice. If there's any
people listening to us now who are wondering about how to to live a life of virtue, especially
when it's difficult. I would just really then pray the rosary every day and consecrate yourself
to the Blessed Mother. It'll make a big difference.
Yeah, see, I'm looking at a quote right here from St. Louis demand for Mary is the safest,
easiest, shortest, most perfect way of approaching Jesus and will surrender themselves to her
body and so without reserve in order
to belong entirely to Jesus. And yeah, thank you for sharing that witness. Very, very powerful
reality that we have in our Blessed Mother. And so, yeah, I guess what else along those lines,
where was the Blessed Mother? How was she helping you in the process of discerning vocation or
in the process of even after coming through the discernment of vocation?
just in the trials of life and any particular stories
that jump out to you where you can remember
that she was prominently there helping you.
I think she, I think there's ways that God's grace comes to us through her
intercession that will only know really in heaven. But for me, you know, the
experience of discerning my vocation and then beginning to live religious life,
I hate to put it this way, but it was quite easy in the sense that sometimes you hear
people talk about maybe their folks' story and how difficult they go for the next twist
and turn the story.
I mean, the image I like to use is just like a hand fitting perfectly into a glove.
And I think that was really just guidance and there's like that one moment when
You know, you kind of leave home and you're in a new state, you're living with a new group
of people.
And there's just on the natural level, a certain homesickness creeps in.
And you have to just embrace that.
And so I think our lady helped me get through that.
One of the interesting things about the Friars of the Renewal is that our patroness is our Lady of Guadalupe.
And so her image is in all of our chapels and all of our friaries.
And...
My heart is hers when I look at that image and I just know she's my mother and
anything good that's in my life flowed from Jesus through her hands and so that
image is really important in fact.
I'm kind of skipping ahead in the story a little bit, but I did a rescue and an abortion
clinic with Bishop Lynch in
1995 in Dobbs Ferry and he was standing in the driveway and I was sitting in the driveway of
this abortion clinic so cars couldn't drive into the parking lot and people had to walk past us
and as they were walking we had some sidewalk counselors they are offering some alternatives
and help to the women going in but I had with me
at that moment, the image of our Lady of Guadalupe.
Subsequently, we eventually were charged in federal court.
with violating the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances Act.
And we had a very sympathetic judge
since passed away, God rest his soul, John Sbrizzo,
practicing Catholic, and he really did not want
to find guilty a Catholic bishop and a Franciscan monk.
And so he led us, give our testimony,
In court, we took the stand and he gave our attorney great leeway in asking all kinds
of questions and so in federal court, the lawyer asked me, well, what was that image
you were holding?
And so I said, well, that was our Lady of Guadalupe.
And I proceeded to tell the entire story
of the apparitions of our Lady of Guadalupe in federal court
and how it ended.
the Aztec human sacrifice and the significance of why I was holding that image there on that day.
So I'm very grateful to the Lord that I was able to give that testimony and the judge allowed it
because it was written into the into the court proceedings.
Yeah, that's awesome. Yeah, that's great. And at this time, yeah, I guess maybe connecting
those dots a little bit. So, so after your ordination, what was their talk even before
your ordination about your, your sense of calling to continue to do rescues? Was that something
that you had to discern, obviously with with Father Benedict Rochelle or with the order?
How did that go down and how did that continue to
progress even after joining the CFRs.
Right, so that's an interesting story there.
So I entered in September of 92, the friars as a postulant, like kind of a six-month period
before Nevishit.
So that wasn't September, but the previous summer.
I was involved in a rescue in Manhattan and if you remember that was the the summer of the
Democratic National Convention and so
Eventually, when I entered formation, you know, I had to, I couldn't just be getting
arrested.
I had to, you know, follow the program of formation.
So I had to really take a step back and trust, you know, God's plan.
for me at that moment and so eventually we discerned together that rescue should continue
but for that moment of formation it was more important for me not to rescue.
Yes, we are on Holy Ground here with Father Fidelis Moshinsky as he shares some of his personal testimony with us
Consider your own personal testimony. What would you share?
And if you have the opportunity to share personal testimony on the reality of Jesus and his Catholic Church
You have a story to tell as well. We're gonna be right back and hear more from Father Fidelis. Stay tuned
Please join Father Mark Noonan in praying the litany of humility.
Oh Jesus, meek and humble of heart, hear me.
From the desire of being esteemed, deliver me Jesus.
From the desire of being loved, deliver me Jesus.
From the desire of being extolled, deliver me Jesus.
From the desire of being honored, deliver me Jesus.
From the desire of being praised, deliver me Jesus.
From the desire of being preferred to others.
deliver me Jesus, from the desire of being consulted, deliver me Jesus, from the desire
of being approved, deliver me Jesus, from the fear of being humiliated, deliver me Jesus,
from the fear of being despised.
deliver me Jesus, from the fear of suffering rebukes, deliver me Jesus, from the fear of being
contaminated, deliver me Jesus, from the fear of being forgotten, deliver me Jesus, from the fear
of being ridiculed, deliver me Jesus, from the fear of being wronged, deliver me Jesus,
from the fear of being suspected, deliver me Jesus.
That others may be loved more than I, Jesus grant me the grace to desire it.
That others may be esteemed more than I, Jesus grant me the grace to desire it.
That in the opinion of the world, others may be loved.
increase and I may decrease. Jesus grant me the grace to desire it. That others may be chosen
and I set aside. Jesus grant me the grace to desire it. That others may be praised and I
unnoticed. Jesus grant me the grace to desire it. That others may be preferred to me in everything.
Jesus grant me the grace to desire it.
that others may become holier than I,
provided that I may become as holy as I should.
Jesus, grant me the grace to desire it.
Amen.
Welcome back to the Simple Treat Jim Havens here with our testimony Tuesday
today coming from our guest father Fidelis Moshinsky of the Franciscan
friars of the renewal of the CFR's. He has been part of the rescue movement
within the pro-life movement since 1989.
for the past four years, that has taken the form of what is called the Red Rose Rescue.
You can learn more about it at redroserescue.com or the Red Rose Rescue
Facebook page. Father, I want to ask you about becoming a priest that says here in the Catechism
of the Catholic Church, 1597, the sacrament of holy orders is conferred by the lain on of hands,
followed by a solemn prayer of consecration, asking God to grant the ordinance
the graces of the Holy Spirit, required for His ministry,
ordination in Prince, an indelible, sacramental character,
share with us that experience about becoming a priest,
becoming more fully configured to Jesus Christ in this way,
to lay down your life more fully with Him for others
through the sacrament of holy orders,
How did that change? What was the experience like? And did that, was there anything different
that you noticed as you would enter into your ministry, which you had been a part of before
you became a priest, this rescue mission within the pro-life movement, as you
continued to do that, was there something different that you noticed in the nature,
the ontological change that had taken place within you? Now you are a priest of Jesus.
When I entered the friars, I didn't have a clear idea that God was calling me to be a priest.
I wanted to be a brother, I wanted to be a Franciscan.
And I certainly was open to the idea of priesthood, but it kind of developed gradually over time.
Primarily,
by living with and working with other priests and kind of having a first hand
experience and witnessing, what does it mean to be a priest? What is this like? And in particular,
they're both recently deceased, but God bless Father Andrew Apostole and Father Benedict Rochelle,
just spending a lot of time with them, learning from them, seeing their priesthood really
generated within me both the desire and then the awareness to realize God was
calling me for the same ministry and so I you know I went to St. Joseph's
seminary in Yonkers New York and I was ordained in 2001.
And the, I wish I could tell you there was some
kind of a special experience I had at the ordination itself.
I mean, obviously, the sacrament was received.
And but I was extremely nervous.
I remember just walking down that long aisle at St. Patrick's Cathedral.
And I literally like it felt my heart beating against my chest and I very much wanted to
be there.
But the moment when you're anointed with the sacred oils, it was especially significant.
And the way I describe...
the call for myself to be a priest was again this awareness of knowing that from all eternity
when God knew me and when he created me, he wanted me to be a priest and particularly
You talk you asked me about like well what changed afterwards, you know the most significant thing for a priest is when he consecrates
The bread and the wine at the altar in mass and it becomes the body and blood of Jesus
And when he says, in persona, Christi, when the priest speaks in the person of Christ,
and he says, this is my body.
This is my blood given up for you.
That is a whole program of priestly life whereby the priest realizes that his entire
life and everything he has and is is meant
to be joined to the sacrifice of Christ
for the salvation of souls.
And for every priest, depending on where they are
and what their ministry, it takes a different form.
For me, yeah, it has taken a particular direction with regard to pro-life ministry, serving
as a priest within the pro-life movement, and then particularly this whole, you know,
real command of the Lord.
you have to follow my commandments and there's no greater love than to lay down your life for your
friends. And in our community, we have it written in our constitutions or rule of life.
that an essential part of the work of the friars in the area of evangelization and work with the poor is our
public and prayerful witness to the sanctity of life.
And it says explicitly that the friars do not hesitate
to participate in acts of conscientious objection to any action that attacks human life.
And that is what, how we describe, you know, our participation with the, with rescue.
And so, um, each time that I participate with, with rescue, whether it was operation rescue or now with the red rose rescue, I get permission from my superior to do that.
And, you know, as you know, being.
when a religious is in the vow of obedience and they are acting with the explicit permission
of their superior, there's a great confidence that the person is doing God's will. And once you know
you're doing God's will, then you also know that He is giving you every grace that you need to do that will perfectly.
And so there's no need to have self-reliance or anxiety or worry about anything.
but what's required is simply faith and trust.
And so that's one of the main blessings
of being in religious life,
is having that grace of obedience.
And I'm hoping that my pro-life ministry
is blessed with that grace.
And thankfully, the community I belong to
is very supportive of what I'm doing with that.
outstanding yes and again that community Franciscan friars of the renewal the
CFR's you can go to their website and learn more Franciscan friars.com
Franciscan friars.com so the pro-life
ministry continued even after becoming a priest so your life became more full
and active. I imagine after being ordained to the priesthood there were
probably more demands that were being
made, but your call to this rescue mission within the pro-life movement, it continued.
Can you just speak to it a little bit further because we can kind of look at this from stepping
back and kind of seeing it from one vantage point and you kind of see, you know, things
are branded and there's
certain organizations involved. It was Operation Rescue. Now it's Red Rose Rescue.
But for you, has the heart always been the same? The call to follow Jesus, to go and love Jesus,
as he called us to in Matthew 25,
Whatever we do unto him, whatever we do unto the least of these, or do not do unto the least of the least of these we do, or do not do unto him.
And it's really loving him in these little ones. Share with us about your heart and in the pregnant moms in need as well.
I would also consider them as part of the least of these, but how do you see it? What is it that is the heart of this for you?
the heart of it is trying to allow Jesus to be present to people in all of these
situations and I do that as a priest so
One of the things that very, very significant and important in the pro-life movement is
all the post-abortion ministry that occurs.
Very soon after I was ordained, I became involved with Rachel's Vineyard, kind of a retreat program began by Dr. Teresa Burke, and speaking with and praying with and ministering to men and women who have experienced abortion in the past.
And really
being a witness to how amazing God's grace is when
these people turn to the Lord and seek his forgiveness and healing and so
That is
I wish I could do those retreats every weekend because there are so many people who need
to experience the Lord in this way because of things in their past.
And so that's very significant.
The other important part, we've been talking a bit about rescue, but what's crucially important,
not everybody could rescue and not everybody should.
You know, get arrested trying to stop abortions peacefully, but, but I've been very involved
with the group called the Helpers of God's Precious Infants.
founded by Monsignor Philip Riley in the Diocese of Brooklyn.
And this was a group that predated the 40 days for life campaign,
but it is very similar in terms of praying at the abortion clinics and having people offer practical help,
trying to talk to mothers and fathers going inside.
And so, here in where I live in the New York area, we've been having these, what we call
the witness for life every first Saturday at the Planned Parenthood in Lower Manhattan.
And we have mass first in a nearby church, and then we have our rosary procession to
the Planned Parenthood.
And sometimes we have anywhere between 100 and 200 people praying the rosary with sidewalk
counselors, and then we return to the church for benediction.
And so the power of united prayer with the Blessed Virgin Mary.
to effect a public witness to the sanctity of human life is so needed in our world right now.
And if anybody is listening who feels inspired perhaps or maybe who is already participating in this,
it's critically important to not simply
say on pro-life or to believe, you know, abortion is the taking of innocent life, but we have to be present where that is happening, and we have to go there with the love and the compassion of Jesus.
And otherwise, all of our speech is just rhetoric and it rings hollow.
And this is why, again, I know this has been a topic recently, but I feel very strongly
about it.
I know you do too, Jim, is that pro-abortion politicians should absolutely be refused
holy communion until they publicly repent of their position.
Absolutely. Yeah, it's absolutely. It's extremely clear. So yeah, thank you for
saying it in a time where sadly, for many leaders, it's not, it's not very
clear, but yeah, important to state it clearly. It is a clear, a clear truth. And
so I also want to point out to people as Father Fidelis is talking about post
abortion healing that, you know, whether you are a mother or a
father who might have experienced the pain of abortion, you might be not sure where to
go with that, what to do with that. Maybe you're a sibling, you found out that that one of
your siblings was aborted, was killed in this way, and you're not sure where to go
with that, what to do with that, how to think of that.
If you go to Level End Child Killing,
LevelEndChildKilling.com, click on the healing tab.
Lots of great resources there.
Rachel's Vineyard is there, as Father mentioned,
also entering Canaan.
Teresa Bonapardis, a very important work there.
So there are a lot of great people,
a lot of great resources that are there waiting for you
to help you in this healing process,
but you gotta reach out and go there.
So love and childkilling.com, click on that healing tab.
We're gonna be right back with more
from Father Fidelis.
Stay tuned.
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Hello, this is Father Frank Pavan of Priests for Life.
If we read the letters of St. Paul in the order in which they were written,
we see Paul more aware of his sins as life goes on.
We in the pro-life movement are not self-righteous people who think we're better than others.
Rather, we begin with repentance, realizing that we recognize the sins in the world
only after we've recognized our own.
This is Father Frank Pavan, National Director of Priests for Life.
This is Jesuit Father Robert McTade, your daily host for the Catholic Current.
Join us at 5 p.m. Eastern.
for our special Friday format.
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Who needs Catholics?
Believe it or not, Catholics do have a future.
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of the upcoming Sunday scriptures,
so you'll be all prayed up for Sunday Mass.
That's the Catholic current on Friday at 5 p.m. Eastern,
coming to you from the station of the cross
and the I Catholic Radio Movement.
Welcome back to the simple tree, Jim Havens here with our guest today, Father Fidelis.
Moshinsky. It is personal testimony Tuesday, and Father Fidelis is of the Franciscan friars of
the renewal of the CFRs. You can learn more by going to fransiscanfriars.com. But this is it,
final segment. So down the stretch we come, Father, anything, any place you want to go,
anything that is stirring in you that you would like to share with us in terms of personal testimony
on the reality of Jesus and his Catholic Church.
Yeah, two things maybe, Jim, we're going to talk about devotion to the saints and angels,
particularly St. Michael.
I have here behind me a statue of St. Michael.
I
When we talk about being pro-life and trying to counter the culture of death, we realize
this is a spiritual battle and we have to...
understand that we are not in it alone, that we have very powerful friends,
intercessors in heaven, and we need to invoke them and frequently.
I have received permission here in New York to perform the Pope Leo the 13th
exorcism at abortion clinics.
And part of that exorcism includes prayers to St. Michael asking him to assist in the
expelling the presence of evil in those places.
And
So I've been doing that for a number of years now and the reason I mentioned it is because
you know standing on the sidewalk and reciting the exorcism in Latin and
Spiritually, I know a lot is happening, but physically, as you just look around, nothing
changes.
The building is still there.
The people are still performing the abortions inside the building.
And, at one point, I remember I kind of asked the Lord,
to give me a little sign, just a little sign that what I'm doing is making some difference somewhere.
And nothing happened. I just continued with the exorcism and then I was I was leaving and I was
a few blocks away crossing the street and these two gentlemen called out to me and they approached
me and one of them
said, I don't know why, I don't know why, but he reached into his pocket and he handed
me something and it was like a little card like the size of a posted stamp, but it was
a picture of St. Michael.
I had just asked for a little sign invoking St. Michael, and this is what I get.
And so, you know, I don't have a lot of intense spiritual experiences, but like the little ones that I have, I really clean to them.
And so, you know, when you pray to St. Michael,
Things might not visibly change in front of you, but he hears your prayer and he brings that prayer to our Lord
and and he is fighting with us on the Jesus Christ and so
So I encourage everybody to invoke all the angels and saints, especially St. Michael at this time
Mm-hmm outstanding and was that what you said two things which were both things in there?
Right. Okay. No, no, the second thing was, I just wanted to, um, because you hadn't mentioned
earlier with, with the Red Rose rescue and maybe just kind of fill that out a little bit for people,
in terms of what it is and what we're doing. It's quite simple.
Many people in the pro-life movement are familiar with praying outside and having people hand
out literature to people passing by or going inside the abortion clinic.
And what Red Rose Rescue does following the example of a pro-life woman in Canada, Mary
Wagner, is we don't just do that outside, but we go into the waiting room of the abortion
clinic.
And we peacefully enter, sit down in the waiting room and initiate conversation with the mothers
who are waiting to get abortions.
And we offer them
or red rose, which has attached to it crisis pregnancy, help information, phone
numbers to call, and we ask them to stand up with us and to leave.
And the second aspect of the mission with Red Rose rescue is to remain in solidarity with the children who are being killed there.
They're just as real and as human and has as many rights as we have.
And if you were...
in the hospital, and you were dying, and the doctors said to you and your family,
I'm sorry, there's nothing more we can do for you. You would want somebody to remain with you in
your final moments in prayer as an expression of your value, the value of your life. And so for
that reason, when the police come and they ask us to leave,
In fact, tell us we have to leave because we're on private property.
We say, no, we're intervening in a life and death situation, and we're going to remain
here in solidarity with the children who are being killed.
And, in fact, just a few days ago in White Plains, New York, a number of us did a red
rose rescue.
And we had extensive conversations with the police explaining exactly why we were there
and...
As a result of that rescue, it seems as if there were at least three women who had gone there for
an abortion of leaving that morning. So I just wanted to talk about Red Rose Rescue because,
you know, the abortion clinic, the whole abortion industry, they set up these property lines.
And, you know, for pro-lifers who go out and pray and counsel at abortion clinics, the
police and the abortion clinic make it very clear to the pro-lifers, where is the line
that you can't cross?
This is public space.
This is private property.
And when Red Rose rescue, you know, we follow Proverbs 2411, which says, rescue those being
dragged to slaughter.
And so the love of Christ
that impels people to try to rescue both the mothers
and the children from abortion.
That love should not respect an artificial property line
set up by the industry of death.
And so we cross that line,
we peacefully go into the abortion facility
and we give that witness then
and then we continue the witness when we go to court.
And we plead not guilty. We present a justification defense. We say to the judge and the prosecutor,
Roe v. Wade is invalid. It has no bearing on this case. And we were not guilty of trespassing
because we were trying to save mothers and children from a real harm.
In fact, we did a rescue in Trenton, New Jersey a couple of years ago, and we were able to get
submitted to the court expert testimony from a doctor who has researched post-abortion syndrome.
In other words, the psychological damage
that abortion causes women and so that we were acting in those moments to try to
prevent that harm from coming to both the mothers and the children and the
the judge allowed the testimony to be presented we're still waiting for a trial
date for that and hopefully it will come soon.
I want a great blessing to have you on today, Father Fidelis, to share some of your personal
testimony with us.
Folks can go to redrodesrescue.com to learn more about that or the Red Rose Rescue Facebook
page.
Also, FranciscanFryers.com to learn more about the CFRs.
But Father, again, thank you so much.
Can you close us out with a final blessing?
Let us pray. May almighty God bless us, all of our listeners.
Benidikar, vosom, ipotens deos, pater, et filios, et spiritus, asanteus, amen.
Amen.