These are beautiful little Catechism stories that you can read and discuss with your children. Each story has the application giving ideas on what can be talked about at the end of the anecdote. We have used these for the children at our Legion of Mary meetings for years.
by Father Lawrence G. Lovasik
PICKING SILVER DOLLARS
According to an ancient tale, a man once picked up a silver dollar. From that time on he kept his eyes steadfastly on the ground in the hope of finding another. And, in the course of a long life, he did manage to pick up quite a number of silver dollars.
During all those days when he was looking for money, however, he did not see that heaven was beautiful above him, that people were friendly, and that some of them were in need of the things which his findings could buy. In fact, he never once allowed his eyes to look up from the mud in which he had sought his treasure.
The result was that when he finally died, as a rich, old man, he knew this fair earth of ours only as a muddy road on which to pick up money.
Application: Serving God. Salvation. Heaven. Happiness. Avarice. Sloth.
ST. BONAVENTURE AND ST. THOMAS
St. Bonaventure was preparing a sermon as he walked up and down the monastery garden. He would speak out loud occasionally. Every so often he was heard saying, “My God, I love You.”
Brother Giles happened to hear him. He approached him and said, “Father Bonaventure, how wonderful it is that you can love God so much. What a blessing it is to be learned.”
St. Bonaventure replied, “Any old lady is able to love God even as Bonaventure.”
Brother Giles, who was a very simple soul, immediately ran through the streets of the town and told each old lady he met, “Father Bonaventure said that you can love God just as he does.”
St. Thomas Aquinas would often write the words : “Ave Maria” or “O Deus, amo Te” (“O God, I love You”) in the middle of the sentences of his manuscript. A photostatic copy of the original shows these little insertions. Even as he worked, he loved God and His blessed Mother.
Application: Love for God. Prayer. Love in actions.
FRED SNITE’S NURSE
Frederick Snite, Jr., lived in an iron lung for 18 years. Miss Pesek was his nurse for only two of those years, 1949-51. But she says she owes this most famous polio victim in the world more than anyone else does: for it was through Mr. Snite that the gift of faith was given her.
The heavy shadow that hung over all was the fear that the iron lung might go wrong. Every day Fred’s parents, his wife, and his children would kneel in front of the iron lung and recite the Rosary with him, very slowly; the three little girls would be closest to their father.
That soft, unhurried prayer impressed Miss Pesek, just as she was impressed by Fred’s patience and simplicity. When she took the job, she had been afraid the family would talk her into the Church, but nobody mentioned religion to her.
Fred did a lot of spiritual reading. Without saying anything, Miss Pesek started to read about the Church when she was off duty. Once shortly before daybreak, Miss Pesek noticed a sudden silence. The machine had stopped pumping. The bellows were not moving. She knew that Fred could last only about as long as a normal person could survive under water.
She ran to the telephone, but got no answer. Then she grabbed the handle that was used to pump the bellows by hand in emergencies; but it was stuck. She took off her slipper and banged the handle with the heel, but still couldn’t move it.
Fred was going fast. She cried, “Pray, pray, pray!” Then she pumped the bellows without using the handle for an eternity of 20 minutes. Finally help came.
Ten minutes later when everything was all right again, she heard Fred say, “Poor Miss Pesek! What an ordeal for you.” Miss Pesek really cried, not because she was sorry for herself, but because he was always so sorry for everybody else.
Miss Pesek went to Fred Snite’s funeral in 1954. A eulogy was given, but she could only think of the words that Fred had once said: “The faith that brought me peace also taught me that this life is a preparation for the next. In other words, I have a job to do like everybody else. I have not been left out.”
Application: Faith. Love for God. Serving God. Salvation. Prayer. Death. Peace. Indifference. Patience. Conversion. Actual grace.
ST. CHARLES BORROMEO
Engaged in a game of billiards one day with two clerics, Charles Borromeo was asked by one of the priests, “What would you do, Your Eminence, if you were told that in five minutes you would drop dead? Would you get on your knees and pray, or would you run off to confession?”
The saint smiled and answered, “I would quietly continue this game of billiards. I began it with the intention of offering it all up to God’s honor, and if my action is for God, why should I stop even if that action happens to be recreation?”
Application: Love in actions. Serving God. Salvation. Love for God. Obedience.
JOHN’S CATECHISM
During the Battle of Britain, John Roberts was on radar duty on the south coast. He called himself a Methodist. Secretly and nervously he visited a priest. Rather awkwardly he explained the reason for the visit: “I’ve no intention of becoming a Catholic, but I am engaged to a Catholic WAAF. I admire her ideals and wish to know more about them.”
The priest gave him a catechism, which John later read in a canteen while dog fights were being waged overhead. When John told his fiancée, she asked delightedly, “And what do you think of the catechism?”
“Plain common sense,” he replied. “I’d have to be a Catholic now, even if you don’t marry me.” She did marry John.
Kathleen, before becoming engaged, and unknown to John, told Our Blessed Lady that she was trusting in her implicitly and then handed him over to her protection. “After that,” John said, “how could I have resisted the Faith?”
Application: Christian Doctrine. Good example. Serving God. Faith. Conversion. True Church. Actual grace.
THE CATECHISM
A lady of high degree and great fortune once knelt at the feet of St. Pius X and said with earnestness, “What can I do for the Church, Your Holiness?”
“Teach catechism,” was the prompt and unexpected reply.
Application: Christian Doctrine. The Church. Catholic Action. Martyrdom.
VOLTAIRE
On February 25. 1758, one of the most violent foes of Christianity, Voltaire, wrote to his friend d’Alembert: “Twenty years hence the good God will be doomed.”
Exactly twenty years later, on the very same date, February 25, 1778, his doctor informed the dying Voltaire that his condition was hopeless. And Voltaire asked that a priest be sent for. But his anti-Catholic attendants would not grant his wish.
Voltaire begged despairingly for a confessor, but in vain. He gave a horrible cry and died.
Should you visit the palace of Frederick the Great, just outside Berlin, you would be shown the room of Voltaire. This is the man who had spent the best years of his life trying to prove that there was no God.
You will find everything just as he left it. You would wonder what he would say if he were able to speak once more from his antique chair.
Travel now to Paris and behold the house once occupied by the so-called “infidel”. There is practically nothing that reminds us of Voltaire. The place is, curiously enough, piled with Bibles.
And Voltaire had said that 100 years would see the Bible pass out of existence! Instead, he is gone and, as if to remind the world of his folly, his own house has become the headquarters of the British and foreign Bible Institute.
Application: Eternity of God. Faith. The Bible. Salvation. Death.
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I beleive St Gerard majella gave a similar responce that St Charles did, but different occupation. I think people think that’s a fun question for saints and then they get an unexpected reply.
So sad about Voltaire…. I think he went to see St John Bosco, once, but it is not know what was said.
There’s were all wonderful little stories! Thank you. 😊