Reparation: Freely Suffering for the Good of Another

Gregory Wietrzychowski – on a walking pilgrimage of penance and reparation.

Penance and reparation for our sins – and for the sins of others – can seem strange to non-Catholics and even to many Catholics in these days.  Yet Jesus opened for us, and for all called into His Name, His surprising act of love: the Cross.  He said,

“If any man would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me.” (Mt 16:24)
“… and he who does not take his cross and follow me is not worthy of me.” (Mt 10:38)
And again, He said,  “Greater love has no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends.” (Jn 15:13)
His Apostle John wrote, “By this we know love, that he laid down his life for us; and we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren.” (1 Jn 3:16)

Concerning reparation, I wrote the following on my website Renew the Church! on the page, The Path of Renewal –

Reparation is an invisible, spiritual work of repair, of restoration, of rebuilding, of cleansing and of renewal. Reparation is owed in justice, for the damages and insults of sin. Reparation is a work of sacrificial love, following the example of Jesus. Reparation is a silent and hidden apostolate, seeking and receiving no praise of men, trusting only in the Father who sees in secret and rewards in secret.

Reparation is an apostolate open to all, and especially to the ordinary. The most common and ordinary of human works can be offered to God in a loving gesture of reparation, and are received in love. The most ordinary of persons, in the most ordinary of lives, can offer in prayer to God the most ordinary of moments – yet in the transforming power and light of love – unto holy reparation in union with the Cross of Jesus. There is no suffering that God permits to us too great or too small that we cannot unite with His holy sufferings on the Cross. Reparation is a work of love, our common vocation. Reparation is a fruit of prayer along the ordinary path to holiness, our universal call.

Gregory Wietrzychowski is a man who heard the call to respond to Christ in this apostolate.  My wife Deborah and I had the humbling privilege of meeting him and talking with him this week – as we had a similar privilege some weeks earlier, in meeting and talking with Mark Byerly.  Mark, similarly, heard and responded to this call of the Lord in a strong and definitive way.  You may remember hearing of Mark Byerly, if you read my blog post A Pilgrimage of Penance, Prayer and Sacrifice, and saw the video on that page (the video produced by Michael Voris).  I wrote again on Mark and his ministry on a second post, Update on A Call to Desert Hermitage… Mark Byerly.

Interestingly, it was in watching the video of Mark and his personal response, that Gregory came to know that he also must respond to this need for penance and reparation in our culture.  Gregory is responding, and heroically, and is bearing witness now in his seventh month of an expected two-year walking pilgrimage to Marian shrines  in the U.S.  At each shrine, he prays the Rosary and prayers of reparation and penance.  Like Mark, he does not ask for money or even for a ride.  He will ask for food or water, if it seems really needed.  He will accept a ride if freely offered, and money too, but he has entrusted himself and his pilgrimage to the care, the protection and the provision of Mary his Mother.  His back-pack, and his front-pack, together are heavy!  I lifted them, I know.  I asked how much they weigh; his response, “Well, about seventy pounds now, but maybe eighty after I add some food for the road.”  Yes, those are grey hairs in his beard and on his head.  But speaking of the weight of these bags, he said simply, “It’s the Cross.”

Please pray for Gregory, and for Mark, and for all men and women in Christ who are hearing the call in our time for a full-hearted “Yes!” to our Lord.  Jesus is calling His Church to bear witness to His Gospel, His very Good News of holy life, eternal life, pure divine love, clear and unstained truth.

A Daily World news interview with Gregory may be found and read HERE.

Gregory on the road, in ministry of reparation, in prayer for us all.