Blessed Bartolo Longo

Just this week the media was abuzz with news of satanists and Harvard students preparing to offer a sacrilegious "black mass."  I chose to avoid this topic as my preference is to focus on the positives.  In the wake of the media attention, hundreds (if not thousands) of Catholics participated in Eucharistic Adoration and reparation for these grave sins.

I wish to present to all of you a true model for the conversion of satanists - Blessed Bartolo Longo.

Blessed Bartolo Longo was a Satanist that was converted by the Rosary and thereafter became a third order Dominican. He was a "High Priest" of the satanists before his conversion no less! But he died a saint, and a Knight of the Holy Sepulcher.

Blessed Longo wrote of his personal struggles with mental illness, paranoia, depression and anxiety. At one point, he noted struggling with suicidal thoughts, but rejected them by recalling the promise of Saint Dominic, "he who propagates my Rosary will be saved." Longo wrote that this promise is what convinced him to encourage public devotion to the rosary.

Say a rosary for the conversion of those who wished this blasphemy, or live in Satanism.  And let us pray for Blessed Longo's intercession.

 The tomb of Blessed Bartolo in the Basilica of Our Lady of the Most Holy Rosary in Pompei.