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b'Today\\u2019s host(s): Scot Landry and Fr. Matt Williams\\nToday\\u2019s guest(s): Kathy Reda\\n\\n\\n\\nToday\\u2019s topics: The vocation of the consecrated virgin\\nSummary of today\\u2019s show: Kathy Reda reveals to Scot and Fr. Matt the story of her vocation as a consecrated virgin, one of less than 350 in the United States; how her hospital co-workers handled the news that she was being betrothed to Jesus; and how her counter-cultural witness points to eternity every day in her profession as a nurse.\\n1st segment: Scot welcomed Fr. Matt back to the show after being away for nearly a month. They talked on air when Fr. Matt was in Madrid for World Youth Day. He asked Scot is he has rapped the Rosary with his kids yet, referring to our 100th show with Joe Melendrez, the Rosary rapper. The last week has been one of recuperation for Fr. Matt.\\nScot said it\\u2019s a big day at his house today with all three kids starting school, including his youngest who started kindergarten. Fr. Matt said it\\u2019s hard to believe the summer went so quickly and the start of the school year is like the beginning of a new year for youth ministry. Scot agreed that much of everything that happens in the Church either follows the liturgical year or the academic year.\\nFr. Matt shared a very profound experience during the World Youth Day vigil in Madrid with the lightning storm that hit the field of 1.5 million people. At one point, the Holy Father\\u2019s aides asked him if he wanted to end the ceremony early, but the Holy Father refused and asked them to stick it out. Then he asked the pilgrims to pray and soon the rain stopped. Then he invited the pilgrims into the silence and 1.5 million rowdy pilgrims went silent for six minutes of adoration. The next day he blessed the pilgrim crosses given to each participant and asked them to be witnesses to Christ. Fr. Matt asked listeners to pray for pilgrims to be able to live that World Youth Day witness.\\nToday, we\\u2019ll be talking with Kathy Reda about the little-known vocation of consecrated virginity. Typically, consecrated life is religious brothers and sisters, hermits, secular institutes, societies of apostolic life, and consecrated virgins. Most of these aren\\u2019t well known to most Catholics and we plan to profile some of them.\\n2nd segment: Scot and Fr. Matt welcomed Kathy Reda back to the show. She was on the show in early April talking about the Eucharistic Congress. Scot read a from the Catechism of the Catholic Church.\\n\\n\\n\\u201cFrom apostolic times Christian virgins, called by the Lord to cling only to him with greater freedom of heart, body, and spirit, have decided with the Church\\u2019s approval to live in a state of virginity \\u2018for the sake of the Kingdom of heaven.\\u2019 [Mt 19:12 ; cf. 1 Cor 7:34-36.]\\n\\n\\n\\u201c\\u2018Virgins who, committed to the holy plan of following Christ more closely, are consecrated to God by the diocesan bishop according to the approved liturgical rite, are betrothed mystically to Christ, the Son of God, and are dedicated to the service of the Church.\\u2019 By this solemn rite (Consecratio virginum), the virgin is \\u2018constituted \\u2026 a sacred person, a transcendent sign of the Church\\u2019s love for Christ, and an eschatological image of this heavenly Bride of Christ and of the life to come.\\u2019\\u201d\\n\\n\\n\\u201c\\u2018As with other forms of consecrated life,\\u2019 the order of virgins establishes the woman living in the world (or the nun) in prayer, penance, service of her brethren, and apostolic activity, according to the state of life and spiritual gifts given to her. Consecrated virgins can form themselves into associations to observe their commitment more faithfully\\u2026.\\u201d\\n\\n\\nScot said Kathy discerned many different vocations in the Church before coming to consecrated virginity. Kathy said there are 12 of them in the Archdiocese of Boston, 350 in the US, and under 3,000 in the world. Growing up she went to Mass every Sunday, taught CCD, and was involved in CYO. Her family was very involved in St. Mary parish, Dedham. Her mother had an untimely death in 1991 and she grew angry at God and didn\\u2019t go to Mass for six years. In 1997, Life Teen youth ministry started at her parish and a woman in the parish started inviting her to be involved but she refused. For four months she asked her to go and finally one Sunday when her car wouldn\\u2019t start, the woman gave her a ride on the condition she attend the Mass. She was amazed at what she experienced and started going.\\nOn Palm Sunday, during a dramatic re-enactment of the Passion, she was suddenly struck by the reality of Christ dying on the cross for her and she started crying. From then, she got involved in Life Teen and as she shared faith with the kids, she came to know Christ better and better. At first, she didn\\u2019t even know what adoration was but it became a powerful part of her prayer life, hearing Christ speak to her in the silence.\\nScot asked Kathy at what she started to feel called to a religious vocation. She said she always thought she was called to marriage and family, but as she prayed more she began to pray for God\\u2019s will for her. As she looked around at religious orders, none of them appealed to her or seemed to speak to an inner voice. She eventually found out about consecrated virginity. She met with a consecrated virgin and it really spoke to her.\\nWhat about the life of a consecrated virgin attracted her to this particular vocation in the Church? Because she also love being a nurse, she didn\\u2019t have to give that up. Consecrated virgins live and work in the world. Fr. Matt asked how being a nurse is part of her vocational journey. Kathy said anything you do in life is a calling. God puts on your heart what he has planned for you. For nursing, you want to be there for people and help them. She knew her whole life she wanted to be a nurse. Fr. Matt noted she gave up something in giving up marriage, but now has a relationship with Christ with Him at the center of her life. Fr. Matt said he\\u2019s known Kathy for many years and he sees being a nurse in her DNA. Consecrated virginity informs being a nurse and makes it greater.\\nKathy said the people she works with just don\\u2019t understand consecrated virginity. They often claim she won\\u2019t be fulfilled without a sexual relationship, but she replies that she knows many people who are and who aren\\u2019t fulfilled. This isn\\u2019t a sacrifice for her. She lives with Jesus in that, as a consecrated virgin, she can ask her bishop to allow her to have a chapel in her house with the Blessed Sacrament reserved. This fulfills her in the way that others are fulfilled by marriage.\\nKathy fell in love God, but it\\u2019s a unique way compared to how others love God. It is a more spousal type of love. In the rite of consecration, the virgin wears a wedding gown and marital imagery is a large part of the vocation. She becomes betrothed to Christ. Kathy said Christ is always present to her in a particular way that she is called to be his.\\n3rd segment: It\\u2019s time to announce the winner of the weekly WQOM Benefactor Raffle.\\nOur prize this week is by Frederick Marks and by Patrick Coffin.\\nThis week\\u2019s winner is Denise Chmielinski from Ashland, MA. Congratulations Denise!\\nIf you would like to be eligible to win in an upcoming week, please visit . For a one-time $30 donation, you\\u2019ll receive the Station of the Cross benefactor card and key tag, making you eligible for WQOM\\u2019s weekly raffle of books, DVDs, CDs and religious items. We\\u2019ll be announcing the winner each Wednesday during \\u201cThe Good Catholic Life\\u201d program.\\n4th segment: Scot said the rite of consecration is very beautiful. He asked about the promises made in the rite. Kathy said they promise to live a chaste and holy life, to pray the Divine Office, to attend daily Mass, to spend a lot of time in prayer for others, and to remain unmarried and without children. They aren\\u2019t promise obedience or poverty because they support themselves with their own jobs. Scot noted all Catholics are called to chastity within their state in life, while consecrated virgins are called to celibacy. Scot asked how difficult it is to live such a witness in a hyper-sexualized society? Kathy said at first even she was squeamish about telling everyone she was becoming a consecrated virgin. Her co-workers have asked every possible question about it and they just don\\u2019t get it at all.\\nFr. Matt said Kathy is living the eternal marriage feast of the Lamb of God, as depicted in Scripture, and she\\u2019s living it now while we will be living it in eternity. The consecrated virgin is a living sign of something that points to something beyond ourselves.\\nKathy said the reaction to her announcement of her ceremony was, first, \\u201cWhat?\\u201d and then, \\u201cThat\\u2019s kind of cool.\\u201d One Jewish doctor at work, when she told him she was marrying Jesus, he said, \\u201cI knew you\\u2019d marry the top of the class and marry a Jew.\\u201d BEhind her back, she\\u2019s heard people wondering if she knows what she\\u2019s doing.\\nScot said our society confuses pleasure and happiness. People have a problem understanding vocations in the Church that involve a commitment to chastity because they think happiness depends on unbridled pleasure. Fr. Matt said a common theme among young adults who won\\u2019t be committed to one another in marriage and then eventually kind of back into it, rather than considering from the beginning whether God has a plan for them to journey together in this life and into the next. They are so caught up in the moment, they don\\u2019t step back to look at the wider ideal that God has a plan for our lives.\\nKathy said she doesn\\u2019t wake up every day acknowledging she won\\u2019t have kids or a husband. She just is who she is. She lives in the presence of Christ and through the sacraments she stays connected to Christ. It feeds who she is.\\nKathy gets up at 5am to pray before work. She\\u2019ll often work a shift that begins at 7am. If she has an 8-hour shift she attends Mass after work, but if she does have 12-hour shift, she won\\u2019t be able to go that day.\\nAs a consecrated virgin, she doesn\\u2019t live in community so Scot asked who her \\u201ccommunity\\u201d is. Kathy said the community of her parish as well as another consecrated virgin she meets with monthly. Annually, she attends a retreat in Chicago for a national meeting of consecrated virgins.\\n5th segment: Kathy said being a consecrated virgin is a very joyful life. She encouraged all to pray and ask God to reveal what He is calling them to. It is a grace and honor to be His spouse. When you are completely his and can live for him, it makes the path clear.\\nFr. Matt asked whether Kathy is lonely or how she deals with questions of what happens when she dies. She recalled Psalm 60: \\u201cMy Lord, my happiness lies in you alone.\\u201d God provides in this life and the next.\\nKathy said we have to get the word out, especially to priests, so they can share it as an option with those who are discerning God\\u2019s will for them.'