So welcome to our daily rosary meditation.

Let's begin in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit.

Amen.

Let's call to mind all those we've promised to pray for.

Today I am in ours, right in front of the incorrupt body of St. John Vianne, the curate of ours. St. John Vianney was born into a peasant family in a small

town near Lyon in 1786, and he spent so many years of his childhood as a teenager in the fields and tending the flocks

that at the age of 17 he was still illiterate, but he desperately wanted to be a priest.

But soon after he entered the seminary, they asked him to leave mid-semester

because he couldn't keep up with the academic work. But at that point, an old priest took

him under his wing and tutored him and interceded on his behalf with the bishop of

Grenoble who ordained him when he was 29. And before long, thousands of people came from all

over France to hear his wisdom and were converted.

But they were not converted by his brilliant intellect or charismatic personality,

because he possessed neither of these.

He won over even the most rebellious souls by his commitment to two things.

His deep friendship with Jesus through prayer and by living genuine friendship with others.

Now we all have family and friends who are not interested in Jesus, and we may feel that we

don't know enough or that we're not good enough to help them.

But St. John Viennay shows us you don't have to be a theologian.

We just need to do the same thing he did.

Have a deep friendship with Jesus in prayer and then foster an authentic friendship with the people in your life,

because friendship is the bridge to help them cross over to God.

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