SPEAKER 01 : 0:05

One day you stole me, nuncia vit Maria,

SPEAKER 02 : 0:12

At age 10, Father Andre escaped Christian massacres by living in caves in Mount Lebanon with his family. Today, Father Andre works tirelessly to encourage American leaders to keep God in the public square, defending religious freedom at home and abroad, so that all might live in peace for the glory of God. Founder and president of the Mission of Hope and Mercy, Father Andre has learned the secret to safety, joy, and peace. Love God and one another. Now, let us spend 33 minutes on the Lord’s Day, retuning ourselves to the truth of love in the hands of God.

SPEAKER 01 : 0:50

Praise be the most holy name of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, now and forever and ever. Amen. My dearly beloved brothers and sisters, on this day, we had issued a statement on Tuesday of this week prior to March 15, prior to this Sunday, that we wanted to celebrate this day in memory of Abuna Pierre Rai, Abuna or Father Pierre Rai, a Maronite Catholic priest who was in South Lebanon, namely in the High Galilee area, And as a priest there, he was the vicar for the actual clergy for the High Galilee. Multiple priests between five and seven other parishes were under his spiritual, I would say, leadership and service. And this is actually the High Galilee area where we and the Mission of Hope and Mercy had repeatedly helped our people since 2023. Father Pierre, who was a priest brother, a priest liaison for the Mission of Hope and Mercy work in Lebanon, also was a personal brother to me personally as Father Andre. We had to spend a lot of time, him and me together. We had prayed for our churches together. We had helped move in the food for our people together, him and me. We had issued a statement speaking about his passing, speaking about the way he died. Unfortunately, Abouna Pierre or Father Pierre died in testimony for his desire for peace, died while he was serving the injured, while he was reaching out to his parishioners to try to save them from the peril of death. And of course, Father Pierre was known that four days before his murder in South Lebanon, to have gathered all the pastors around them and to have said that we will not leave South Lebanon because South Lebanon is our homes and we will not leave because we are to stay in our homes. We don’t have weapon. We will not leave our people And we do not want any strangers to come to us. We do not want any strangers to come and occupy our homes and our villages. And none of us carry any weapon. We carry nothing but kindness, goodness, love and prayer. And of course, the only thing that they carried, they are in the rosaries. And he said, we are ready to die in our homes. And of course, in the message of Father Pierre, he said so many beautiful things as well. And most of all, in the way I knew Father Pierre Arai, despite his weak health, being a judge in a Maronite tribunal, Father Pierre also was known to have chanted every time for his parishioners, The hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with you. Blessed art thou amongst women. Blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus. Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners now and at the hour of our death. Amen. He was known to have chanted this beautiful prayer to Our Lady in the Aramaic language of Our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. And today, we will launch Irrevocable as well in conjunction with 33 Minutes on a Lord’s Day. After this show ends with KLZ, you may tune in at 10 a.m. And go to our website, missionofhopeandmercy.org. That is missionofhopeandmercy.org. And you may go also to our YouTube channel of the Mission of Hope and Mercy as well. And there you will accompany us in an hour and 10 minutes conversation that goes beyond our 33 minutes with the Lord on this Lord’s Day. to listen and to watch as well the special program we prepared to accompany this Memorial Day that we have asked everybody to join us in prayer for the mission of hope and mercy. And in this, let us begin with the prayers for this beautiful day and let us pray. O God, come to my assistance. O Lord, make haste to help me. Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit, as it was in the beginning, is now, and will be forever. Amen. Remember, my brothers and sisters, in the Gospel of St. Luke, chapter 1, verse 69. St. Luke tells us, he has raised up for us a mighty Savior, born of the house of David, his servant. Look on us, Lord, and see how we are despised. Today was Psalm 89. Let us pray. And yet you have rejected and spurned and are angry with the one you have anointed. You have broken your covenant with your servant and dishonored his crown in the dust. You have broken down all his walls. and reduce his fortresses to ruins. He is despoiled by all who pass by. He has become the taunt of his neighbors. You have exalted the right hand of his foes and have made all his enemies rejoice. You have made his sword give way and have not upheld him in battle. You have brought his glory to an end. You have hurled his throne to the ground. You have cut short the years of his youth. You have heaped disgrace upon him. How long, O Lord? How long, O Lord, will you hide yourself forever? How long will your anger burn like a fire? Remember, Lord, the shortness of my life and how frail you have made the sons of man. What man can live and never see death? Who can save himself from the grasp of the grave? Where are your mercies of the past, O Lord, which you have sworn in your faithfulness to David? Remember, Lord, how your servant is taunted, how I have to bear all the insults of the peoples. Thus your enemies taunt me, O Lord, mocking your anointed at every step. Blessed be the Lord forever. Amen. Amen. Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit, as it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, world without end. Amen. My brothers and sisters, thank you so very much for your kindness and for willing to spend this beautiful time with us on this beautiful and holy Sunday in which we are commemorating the memory of Abouna and Father Pierre Rai. Let us begin with our beautiful time together on these 33 minutes. And what do we have to share with you today is very important. It’s very important because simply it conveys to all the world the beauty of the service of the priest in a hard land that is broken by wars, by captivity, by plagues, and by hunger. You know, since 2019 until today, I wonder if there is anything that did not pass on the poor Lebanese people in Lebanon. They suffered a lot, of course, and amidst their suffering, you know, God only knows how much more they can put up with suffering and with the pain. In the season of Lent, the Mission of Hope and Mercy has been running a Lenten retreat every Wednesday in an ecumenical service at the Lutheran Church of Atonement, and also every Friday evening at 6.30 from the Chapel of Our Lady Queen of the Angels, Queen of Peace, to share with you the gifts and the graces of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. And of course, every Sunday at 11.30 a.m., we have been also sharing together the words of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ and sharing together the beauty of our faith. And in this season, we have been asking our donors, our friends, our benefactors, our listeners on KLZ to help and assist the work of the Mission of Hope and Mercy. Yet today we come to honor in a very special way all these sufferings, all these pains of the Lebanese people, the Christians in a particular way. My personal pain and the persecution to which I was subjected and still suffer from and the pains and the sufferings of the mission of Hope and Mercy. Today, we look to each other, we reach to one another, we extend our hands to one another, from the sacred heart of Jesus, from the Immaculate Heart of the Virgin Mary, to tell one another, be strong, have courage, be not afraid, for Jesus Christ, our Lord and Savior, has conquered the world, and that He is with us, and He will not leave us at all. Lebanon has been on the tip of an apocalyptic volcano at least for years now, but more likely since 2006. This volcano, unfortunately, has grown and has erupted multiple times in seasons and out of seasons, as we say. And every time this volcano erupted, has reaped with it lives of innocent people. has weakened the stability and the livelihood of the Lebanese people. The mission of Hope and Mercy since 2015 has been consistently present as a good Samaritan, as a prophet who’s trying to preach the peace, the reconciliation, the healing and the message of the Holy Gospel of life and salvation of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ to these people who are broken hearted. We have been consistently present amongst them, serving them and helping them with a beautiful group in our spiritual family of the mission of hope and mercy from the United States who dedicated funds, dedicated time, dedicated the prayer, dedicated talents, dedicated the treasure in order to help and assist with relief funds repeatedly the poor and injured people of Lebanon and of many areas in the Middle East. Since 2015, we have assisted Christians coming from the Middle East to seek refuge in Lebanon, Syrian communities, Iraqi communities from the Caldino Church who came to Lebanon seeking refuge, to be treated in hospitals, to receive the help and the aid, to have housing, to have food, to have medicine. So the work of the Mission of Hope and Mercy has been very significant, has assisted how in times of trouble, in times of tribulations, people could still remain focused on their journey of faith with Jesus Christ and through Jesus Christ and in Jesus Christ to maintain connection to our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ during times of trial. And of course, in the season of Lent, what else do we expect to happen except probably more drama, more trauma, more injustice, more hunger, more internally displaced people? More wars, unfortunately, for whatever what reasons that leaders of the nations might justify. We see that the cause of the Lebanese people is just cause. We see that we are torn between how to serve the just cause of the people of the Middle East, yet at the same time, how to fight and stop terrorism, how to fight and stop terrorism the persecution against Christians, how to fight and stop the anti-Semitism that is our proportion, not only in the Middle East, but also here in the United States. And I couldn’t see a better time than the season of Great Lent, in memory and in honor of the soul of Abouna, Father Pierre El-Rai, a martyr in service of his wounded people, a martyr in the service of the love of God and the love of the neighbor, a minister for the peace whose last name, El-Rai, carries in itself literally the word shepherd, and his first name, Pierre, Peter, Boutros, Kifas, the Rock, means literally the rock. So incorporating our pain, our suffering, our own persecution from which we have suffered, today, as I celebrate the Holy Mass in the chapel of the Mission of Hope and Mercy at 11.30 a.m. here in Lakewood, Colorado, in this Holy Mass, we summon all the pains of the people in the Middle East, the innocent ones, We summon all their intentions for peace, for truth, for justice, for healing, to serve the cause of their true sovereignty, that they can raise their families in peace. They can go to their places of worship in the fullness of faith and their freedom of religion. for other religious groups as well, but namely to practice the faith in our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ for those followers of Jesus who in Middle East keep dwindling down in less and less and less significant numbers, yet they will never lose their significant influence. Because they will be the seeds of the good soil that Jesus Christ himself has planted. And they will remain as such because of the blood of martyrs like Abouna Pierre. And because of your support. to the work of the Mission of Hope and Mercy. We’re in solidarity today on this wonderful day of Sunday. The church in America accepting the invitation of the Mission of Hope and Mercy. The faithful people of God here in Denver metro area, in Colorado Springs, in Fort Collins, in every town, in Lakewood, in every city of our beautiful state of Colorado and the neighboring states. and across the entire U.S. as our nation, as one nation under God, I extend this call of solidarity to reach the entire world, to stand in solidarity with the blood of the martyrs, that the seed of their blood will make a flourish in the territory of the Holy Land, in Israel, in Palestine, in Lebanon, in Syria, in Iraq, in Iran, In all over the Middle East, times of peace, times of healing, times of justice, times of the truth of God, times of light that could demolish and dispel all darkness, time in which, because of the pain and the passion of us all, because of our sacrifices, in this season of Lent, because of our fasting and prayer, God, in his most holy name, in our most holy Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, through his precious blood, and through the intercession of Mary, the Queen of the East, the Star of the East, Mary, the Mother of God, Mary, Queen of Peace, Mary, the Queen that is conceived without original sin, that our Heavenly Father, the Omnipotent One, in our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, will crush the demons in the Middle East, will crush everyone whose ill will is to promote more terrorism, more anti-Semitism, more hate against Christians, or also they spread more falsehood and use in the name of God to kill others. We pray that the Muslims will succeed in this time of trial because the test now is their test. They have to stand up to free their religion from any call to hate, from any use or abuse of the name of God in order to justify hate or to justify killing. We look forward in the season of Lent that also the Muslims who celebrate a similar time, that they will stand for a God of life, for a God of love, for a God of true peace, a true surrender in the divine will, where God came offering his life in order to redeem us, not killing others, in order to declare peace. An ummah or a kingdom that may have nothing to do with the divine plan of salvation of Almighty God. I know many Muslims in the world are suffering, but many millions of Christians as well, many millions of Jews as well. Many people of goodwill now are afraid for their lives, for their properties, for their livelihood, for their religion. If there is a point to make in honor and in memory of Abouna Father Pierre Errahi, who died less than a week ago in a service of the wounded in his village, and as a testimony for the love of God and the neighbor, is this the gift of courage? The gift of courage by word, the gift of courage by deeds, the gift of courage by outreach, When I used to be with him going to South Lebanon and saw how he would go behind and in between blocks, in between dangerous zones, and rockets, airplanes over his head, drones over his head, were always going around to hit targets. And the militaries and the insurgents and members of Hezbollah would go behind his church and the neighboring churches, behind homes in the middle of Christian towns. to put their batteries and to launch rockets against Israel, knowing that Israel will retaliate to the source of fire and will eliminate the danger that is coming to them from across the borders, from the heart of the south in Lebanon. It is so insidious, so sad, it is so evil to see that in their tactics of hate, these members, whether of Hezbollah or any other insurgents, they did not take in consideration the food that Father Pierre has given to them many times probably. Because Father Pierre, like any of us, never discriminate. I was hungry and you gave me food. I was thirsty and you gave me drink. I was naked and you covered me. I was sick and you cared for me. I was in prison and you visited me. And with this, the Lord tells us in the Gospel of Matthew chapter 25, Come, O you blessed of my Father, and inherit the kingdom prepared for you since the foundation of the world. This was the theology, the faith, the spirituality of Abouna, Father Pierre Errahi. This is why he was the best pick, the best choice to be the partner of the Mission of Hope and Mercy, our priest liaison with whom we fed hundreds and thousands of people in South Lebanon, predominantly our Christian families who decided not to leave their homes. It is a big shame to see how the insurgents did not take in consideration that Abouna, Father Pierre, probably fed their families, or probably tended to the wounded people of the Shias and of the Muslim people in the area. He never discriminated. He did not deserve that insurgents will come to his town and disturb the peace of his people and exchange fires into inside Israel that requires Israel to return the favor. Fire met with fire. Brimstones met with brimstones. Yet the collateral damage, the victims are the Christian people who declared their towns free from insurgents, free from strangers, free from any weapons except the weapons of kindness, of goodness, of the desire and the prayer for peace and the desire to reconcile with Israel, with all the Lebanese people, and raising the weapon of the Holy Rosary in prayer to end all terrorism. So somehow, Abuna Father Pierre and the Christians in South Lebanon decided to remain and to live their baptismal promises, emphasizing the need to remain steadfast in their faith, even when facing deadly challenges. And this is what happened to Father Abouna Pierre. God accepted his dedication and he died while he was running to a house on the edge of his town of Kolaïa in South Lebanon, which is in a district of High Galilee by the foothills of Mount Hermon, the famous, holy, sacred Mount Hermon. And there, Abouna, Father Pierre, After he had called all the Christians not to leave their homes, but to remain and to testify for the peace of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ and his triumph over death and evil, he was given the great gift of martyrdom. Yes, today we celebrate a martyr. A martyr, a minister, a priest who’s ordained according to the rite of Melchizedek in one holy catholic and apostolic church whose one of his last events before him and me spoke few days before his passing was to gather all the ministers the protestants the orthodox the catholic the maronite priests and clergy and ministers and pastors Extended invitation also to the Muslim religious leader in the region telling them, we must disarm every form of weapons and we must only arm ourselves with our kindness, with our desire for peace, with our outreach to give food to the people who are in need. But he urged those leaders to help him to please make sure that no military Hezbollah members will come to their villages. Abu Napier was betrayed like his Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. For after they had promised him that no weapons will come into that town, into any of the Christian towns remaining in South Lebanon, the insurgents of Hezbollah betrayed that call, betrayed that promise, and supported, of course, most likely with the people from other religions as well in the Middle East and in the local area. It was that on that day, when in that town, people heard that there are four insurgents coming from Hezbollah into their village. Father Pierre, hearing the sound of bombs and exchange of fires between the insurgents who took over a house of our own parishioners, who we also knew personally, after one bomb dropped in that house, Father Pierre ran for two reasons towards the bomb. One, as a Catholic and good Maronite holy priest, taking the holy oil of the last rites with him, he went with about 10 of his young adults in a parish to tend care to the wounded, to anoint them with the last rite of the holy oil. And the second reason was to chastise the insurgents and to beg them, to plead with them, to leave their hometown. and not to bring any arms to that village. Yet the insurgents continued to exchange fire with Israel, and we are told that a second bomb dropped. And as of the time of the show on this Sunday, March 15th, the feast day of Saint Benedict, and in which we celebrate also in the Sunday of Lent, the healing of the paralytic, according to our Maronite rite, Father Pierre was hit in his foot by a rocket that fell. Information tells us this actual rocket came from Hezbollah. It didn’t come from inside Israel. And Father Pierre who suffers from heart illness and who takes medicine that causes his blood to thin, bleed to death. And as he was bleeding to death, he was heard saying, Forgive them, Father, for they did not know what they are doing. This is a priest, my brothers and sisters, who was a brother priest to me, who believed in my priestly ministry, who met with my team in Lebanon for the mission of hope and mercy at Christmas and after Christmas and two days prior to his death. He kept encouraging me, telling me, Abouna Andre, Father Andre, do not worry. Do not let your heart bleed or be sad. I love you and I stand by you and thank you. You are an example for us in your priestly ministry. This is a priest who came repeatedly encouraging our team for the mission of hope and mercy. with whom they were planning to feed the people in South Lebanon and to start the campaign to assist our people who decided to stay home. So my brothers and sisters, Father Pierre also lived and renewed his baptismal promises right before his death, but this time through the baptism of the blood, not only the baptism of water and the Holy Spirit. This is Father Andre, A Mission of Hope and Mercy. We came together today in honor for the memory of Abuna Father Pierre. I ask you, if you like, tune in to continue with us to see our podcast for Irrevocable, Father Mahana Untamed, which will be broadcast in live at 10 o’clock, 10 minutes after 10 today. mountain time here in Denver, Colorado. Also, if you can spend with us on this day, come or join us online through our X page, our YouTube channel, our Facebook channel for the mission of hope and mercy, for the mission of hope and mercy. As at 1130 a.m., we will celebrate the memorial mass and do the funeral prayers here in our chapel of Our Lady Queen of the Apostles, Queen of Peace, and the presence of our Lord, celebrating His most precious Body and Blood at 11.30 a.m. during the Holy Mass. and for concretizing an action, please join us in solidarity in our campaign, as we really need your help to continue raising funds to assist in the work of the Mission of Hope and Mercy. You may go online to assist us to provide food boxes, medicine over the counter, and to assist our team for the Mission of Hope and Mercy, who in Lebanon is trying to assist over 1,350 families in the neighboring town of Rmeish in South Lebanon and many other villages. missionofhopeandmercy.org Please go there and do your tithing. And may Almighty God bless us all, protect us from all evil, forgive us our sins, and bring us all to everlasting life. And may the soul of Abouna Pierre and all the martyrs, through the mercy of God, rest in peace. Amen. May we have a blessed Sunday.

SPEAKER 02 : 32:18

Thank you for listening to 33 Minutes on the Lord’s Day. To hear previous programs, visit the show page at missionofhopeandmercy.org. Listen to Father Andre every Sunday morning at 7.30 on KLZ as he speaks on the unity of Christians, religious freedom, and the biblical foundation of Judeo-Christian values and traditions. Join him in bringing hope and freedom to people across the globe while also strengthening your own faith, family, and community right here in Colorado. Reawaken the spiritual strength of America. Go to missionofhopeandmercy.org.