John Paul II and Mother Teresa, Their 21st c. Impact

‘Yeah, that makes sense, you’re a priest.’

Posted on: 9th April 2012

ASPEN, CO, USA — After a 10 day hiatus from publishing a daily story, the mission returns with some footage from a recent hut trip to the 10th Mount Division training grounds of World War II. The 10 day hiatus was the result of a server issue, which caused the website to crash two weeks ago. Although not all the content is back up to date, we have begun to publish a new story everyday to the ‘digital continent’. Our team just wants to say thanks for your patience and for sticking with us through these challenges.

Today’s Story



To kick off our return to the daily stories, we begin with Fr. Mike Rapp, who was part of the hut trip thanks to the Aquinas Alpine Club at the University of Colorado. During his story, Fr. Rapp discusses the impact that the Columbine shooting had on his life back in 1999. This tragic event began a series of questionings for Fr. Rapp on the meaning and purpose of life, which thankfully led to the discovery of Blessed John Paul II’s and Mother Teresa‘s lives. Fr. Rapp devoured many of their writings and spiritual works during his journey toward adulthood in the Catholic faith.

Almost twice a month, our team appears to be publishing stories centered around ‘the power of an invitation.’ Today is no different. Fr. Rapp was doing some service work at a school when a janitor simply asked, ‘have you ever thought about becoming a priest?’ For the next couple hours, Fr. Rapp’s task was to help vacuum out the school. As he vacuumed, that invitation began to resonate in his heart. Through many hours of prayer after that invitation, Fr. Rapp decided, ‘yeah, I could be a priest, that would bring happiness to my life.’ After that decision, he began sharing the news with family and friends. He was not sure what their reaction would be, after all, partying and finding trouble was a bit of a past time for his group of friends in high school. But obviously he had good friends, because they said, ‘Yeah, that makes sense, you’re a priest.’ The impact of Blessed John Paul II and Mother Teresa combined with a simple invitation from a janitor all came together through God’s grace to point toward the Priesthood in today’s story. To learn more about how you could begin to discern the priesthood, visit two vocation websites by clicking on their logos above.

Do you know someone who is waiting for an invitation?

OneBillionStories.com Contributor - Steve Seguin

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Yesterday’s Story

Readings for 9th April 2012
First: Acts 2:14, 22-33
Psalm: Psalm 16:1-2a And 5, 7-8, 9-10, 11
Gospel: Matthew 28:8-15

Rosary: Joyful Mysteries
1. Annunciation
2. Visitation
3. Nativity
4. Presentation
5. Finding Jesus in the Temple