Star of the Stormy Sea
Quarterly Newsletter of the Apostolate of Our Lady of Good Success Fall /Winter 2017
“… When your souls suffer temptations, and are immersed in grief …turn to her with confidence and say: ‘Star of the stormy sea of my mortal life, may your light shine upon me so that I do not stray from the path that leads me to heaven.’”
(Taken from “The Testament of Mother Mariana de Jesus Torres” January 16th, 1635)
Dear Friends of Our Lady of Good Success,
MERRY CHRISTMAS AND HOLY NEW YEAR!
“Let us take advantage of these days….to prepare our hearts to receive the Infant Jesus. Already we know that (we) must get dressed in our best garments to celebrate the Birth of the Lord, adorning the manger of Bethlehem with the light of virtues, with the beauty and gentleness of good example, with the straw of mortification, with the delicate purity of the angels, with the joy of the shepherds and with the delight of Mary and Joseph--- each one of us, in humility, desiring to improve ourselves through the faithful fulfillment of the Divine Will.”
(Words of Mother Mariana to her community during Advent of her last Christmas, 1634)
Join us in celebrating our 15th anniversary of the Apostolate of Our Lady of Good Success~!!! We officially began as an apostolate in November 2002. Yes, that’s right! Can you believe it??? We are hoping that you will celebrate with us by helping us to continue to spread this devotion! In our mailings, you will find a new booklet to be used to spread this beautiful Church approved story of the Blessed Mother of God. This is a gift to you for being so supportive over the years! We hope and pray that you will continue to help us with this endeavor because we know that the situation is getting worse in the world and we really rely on your help to keep going. We do not have any millionaires supporting our cause (that we know of … haha) …
Thankfully though, it has always been all of you pulling together to get us through year after year to do this work. We have many on our mailing list, but we have been unable to send this mailing to everyone - but hopefully, we can, with your help!
The past year has been fruitful for our family and we have seen 3 new grandbabies born in 2017 within 8 months so this grandmother has been busy! What a great joy it has been to do so! It is truly a reminder that God is good and watches over us with loving care right from the beginning of conception. However, alas, all this joy has kept me from writing and producing the newsletter due to adjustments needed to be made with family duties to be fulfilled i.e. being a mother and wife, homeschooling, babysitting, and running a lay apostolate!
However, we never want to stop doing this work for Our Lady of Good Success if God wills it to continue! Additionally, our complimentary work has been to spread the writings of the late Fr. Luigi Villa who was given the mission to fight Ecclesiastical Freemasonry within the Catholic Church. We pray we can forge ahead with all our project as well, but funds have been low… We have many things we would like to print….
#1 on our list for reprinting is: "Paul VI beatified?" With the announcement that the Vatican will raise him to the altars in October 2018, we feel the need to push ahead and continue to educate the Faithful. Do you know of anyone who might want to help us with this work?! Would you consider donating for this worthy cause?
We ask for your prayers for us to discern what the Will of God is for us! Could you add this to your list of intentions during the Novena this year?
Devotional Specials for the Feast of Our Lady of Good Success of the Purification and Candlemas!
From now until Our Lady’s feast on February 2nd we will have free items for orders of $25, $50 and $100 orders. You can call for this information and inquire as they may vary. They will come in the form of books and booklets! During this time there will be a 40% discount on novena booklets, chaplets, Chiesa viva #413 “Our Lady Condemns Masonry” and DVD on Our Lady of Good Success! New Booklets enclosed -titled: “Our Star in the Stormy Sea” are $3.00 (qty. discounts available)
We ask you to please pray imploring God to continue to bless our efforts to help the Church!
Update from Quito: New Mother Abbess elected: Sor Ángela María del Buen Suceso. – please pray for her and the Monastery! As we always do, we are collecting for the annual donation for the Feast day of Our Lady of Good Success on Feb. 2.
Also, the Carmelites in Quito requested donations to get a book printed on St Mariana de Jesus de Paredes (patroness & victim soul for Ecuador can. by Pius XII) in honor of the 400th anniversary of her birth! If anyone would like to donate for this worthy cause please let us know!
The following quote from Cardinal Sarto, the future Pope St. Pius X, as he considered the spiritual needs of both clergy and laity alike, seems to be appropriate even today; this was given to his faithful in Genoa, Italy in 1895.
“How necessary it is to stir up again the spirit of faith, at a time when there is a growth of that malignant fever which would discredit everything and deny every dogma of revealed religion! How necessary it is at this present time when people are trying to dismiss the mysteries of our faith, when people are claiming to explain them – while Christ has demanded the submission of the intellect – when they are casting doubt on the most established prophecies, when they are denying the most manifest miracles, when they are rejecting the sacraments, deriding pious practices, and discrediting the magisterium of the Church and her ministers! We must build a dyke against the torrent of evil which is spreading everywhere; we must find the antidote to the poison which is threatening the life of society; we must give this sick world the remedies which will cure it; we must save, by a single word, even the souls of those who hate that word and persecute it, because for them too Jesus Christ shed His precious blood.”
A TESTIMONY OF MIRACULOUS INTERVENTION THROUGH THE INTERCESSION OF OUR LADY OF GOOD SUCCESS
Update on Anthony Resch – 12th Anniversary of a Near Fatal Accident-
Ten years ago, in our September 2007 newsletter, an article was published about Anthony Resch’s close call with death and his miraculous recovery attributed to Our Lady of Good Success. Tony’s mother had written to us shortly after his accident in the early morning hours of October 11, 2005 - the Feast of the Divine Maternity of the Blessed Mother. Mr. Resch, who was 45 years old at the time, was driving a motorcycle down a curvy road in upper Wisconsin in the fog. He lost control of his motorcycle and bounced on the ground hitting his head. Anthony was thrown 30 ft. from his bike and was found unconscious and bleeding profusely from his head and nose. To this day, Anthony does not remember anything of what happened that night. EMT’s and other officials at the scene of the accident listed this accident as “Fatal” as they were certain Tony was not going to make it with all the injuries he had sustained. Additionally, the reports from St Vincent’s Hospital in Green Bay, WI on Tony were very serious. “Prognosis is grim” was the last line of one of the reports. As Tony lay in a coma for almost 3 weeks, he was very fortunate to receive the Last Rites. It was at this time that his mother, Mary Resch, contacted us and said she had received many cards of promised prayers and Masses. In one of those cards, she found the holy card of Our Lady of Good Success. It is then that she began to become acquainted with thi
s devotion and began praying to Our Lady of Good Success for Tony. At the publishing of that 2007 newsletter, Tony had fully recovered except for the loss of vision in his left eye. This is a relatively minor result considering the consensus was that even if he were to survive, he would be a vegetable and live in a nursing home. Tony was able to resume the work he was accustomed to before the accident.
Ten yrs ago, we talked briefly with Tony on May 27th, 2007 as we wanted to know if he could express to us what he felt spared him from death. He said, “The Lord Above and my guardian angel played the major roles in this accident.” He would always say the Guardian Angel prayer before driving and continues to say this prayer when driving even though he no longer drives a motorcycle. (N.B. Tony wore his brown scapular and Sacred Heart badge too). Ten years ago, the Apostolate wrote about Tony: “Tony is not disheartened by his accident. He accepts the loss of the vision out of his left eye as he sees it: ‘if God wills it, it will improve, if not, as a priest told me, perhaps I [will] see better spiritually because of it.’”
Over these past 10 yrs., we have kept in frequent contact with Tony. He had always felt that God had perhaps spared his life because he had some work left to do here. Despite being a rather well-established bachelor, Tony had hopes to find a Catholic lady to marry and help start a family. I must admit even I had my doubts, but low and behold, one-day Tony called in 2012.
He wanted to tell us that he thought he had found the woman he wanted to marry…only there was a little bit of a hitch to this event as the woman was from the Philippines and he had to go and meet her first! He had only met her online… I don’t think I have to tell you how anxious we were for Tony! We told him to continue to pray to Our Lady of Good Success and that we would do so as well!
Despite delays and red tape, they were married on Sept. 8th, 2012 – Our Lady’s birthday and over the past 5 yrs. became the happy parents of 2 beautiful children.
We have been able to visit with them on occasion and truly feel that Our Lady of Good Success intervened in his life! Someone said, “a picture is worth a thousand words” so we share these photos with you! The family photo was taken this summer at the accident site and little Mary Jo can be seen holding the original holy card we sent Tony’s mother in 2005 after the accident.
Tony hopes that his story will “increase the Faith.”
We hope so too as it has for us! God bless you Tony and Mary Lou and your family for your fine example of love and perseverance in the Faith for all of us!
Again, we wish everyone a very Blessed and Mary Christ Mass and a Holy New Year!
Quarterly Newsletter Currently, we are asking a $10.00 donation annually. We do not send out reminders to our members to send a donation. If you are not interested in this publication, please contact us to remove you from the mailing list. Thank you for your continued support! Donations are accepted, greatly needed and appreciated! Visit the website to find out the latest news: www.ourladyofgoodsuccess.com
The Apostolate of Our Lady of Good Success -1288 Summit Ave. Suite 107, Oconomowoc, WI 53066, USA Phone: 262-567-0920