Today is the ninth anniversary of Father Gruner’s passing, on April 29, 2015. Our hearts are still filled with warm affection for this most zealous priest of Jesus Christ, as well as with gratitude and admiration for his tireless labors in the Fatima Apostolate which was his life’s work.
So profoundly like his Divine Master (Whom in the Litany of the Holy Name we call the great Lover of our souls, “Lover of Us”), Father Gruner enriched us all, having poured himself with boundless generosity in the service of the Church, without regard to personal costs. And he did endure tremendous difficulties and persecution for our sake, in order to faithfully announce to us Our Lady of Fatima’s undiluted Message. With the rarest courage, Father Gruner refused to take the course of a self-preserving hireling, being determined like the Apostle Paul not to hold back anything that was needful to us (Acts 20:20), although loving us the more, he was too often (in so many cases and through so many calumnies) loved the less (2 Cor. 12:15).
The unprecedented events of the past four years overturning the last vestiges of Christian order and human rights in Western society have at last begun to drive the too-long neglected Message of Fatima home to the consciousness (and consciences!) of many, but Father Gruner would have been the last person to take satisfaction in seeing himself thus vindicated. It was his greatest hope that we could have been spared the horrors now beginning to unfold.
With our own lives and souls still in the balance, we continue to rely on Father Gruner’s prayers that the Pope and bishops will at last heed Our Lady of Fatima’s requests for the Consecration of Russia to Her Immaculate Heart, and for the promotion of the First Saturday reparatory devotions, before the worst of Her dire prophetic warnings – the annihilation of nations, overtaking countless souls in an unprovided death – comes to pass.
Eternal rest grant unto him, O Lord, and let perpetual light shine upon him. May his soul and the souls of all the faithful departed through the mercy of God rest in peace. Amen.
Watch The Fatima Center’s video tribute,
“In Loving Memory of Father Gruner.”
