By Fr. Thomas Crean, OP
If we open the Old Testament to chapter 17 of the first book of Samuel (called the first book of Kings, in the Douay version), we read of a time when God’s people were sorely pressed by their adversaries, the Philistines. The champion of these pagans was “a man baseborn named Goliath, whose height was six cubits and a span.” This gigantic fellow, clad in impenetrable armour, went out from his camp each morning “to curse the army of the living God,” taunting the soldiers of Israel with cowardice for not daring to meet him in single combat. We read that King Saul, and the officers of his army, were indeed “dismayed and greatly afraid” of the challenge, and that they returned to it no answer.
Most people know the rest of the story. David, the brave shepherd boy, “chose five smooth stones out of the brook, and took a sling in his hand, and went forth against the Philistine.” When the two met for their unequal combat, David, placing a single stone into his catapult, fired it against Goliath’s head: “and the stone was fixed in his forehead, and he fell on his face upon the earth.” In this way, “David prevailed over the Philistine with a sling and a stone.” After that, the captains of Israel recovered their spirits and drove the Philistines back into their own place.
Today, in the midst of the forces ranged against Christ’s people, a new giant has arisen: this is the giant of Euthanasia. Like its Old Testament prototype, it is base-born: though of uncertain parentage, it seems most probably to derive from the union of atheism and hedonism. And as Goliath had an “armour-bearer” who went “before him,” so the giant, Euthanasia, finds men and women in parliament and in the press only too willing to assist him.
In this combat, who is to be our David? You, good reader, if you are baptised. For by baptism you were incorporated into the new David. Did God not promise that in the latter days, “My servant David shall be king over them”? We have been made mystically a part of this Messiah, whom the gospel describes as David’s son and Lord. “We are members of his body, says St Paul, and of his flesh, and of his bones.”
What shall be our sling? Surely, the rosary. True, it is a humble thing to look at. Scripture tells us that when Goliath saw the young David come against him apparently unarmed, “he despised him,” cursing him by his own dark gods. Yet the rosary has won great triumphs before now, both spiritual and temporal. It is not for nothing that one of the titles of the Blessed Virgin is “our Lady of Victories.” And if the history of salvation teaches us anything, it is that God loves to use apparently insignificant means to achieve His ends. “We have this treasure in earthen vessels, that the excellency may be of the power of God, and not of us.”
What do we do, when we recite the rosary? As David selected five smooth stones from the brook that he might place them in his sling, we choose five mysteries out of the life of Christ and turn them over in our minds. A single stone was enough to overcome the Philistine: Christ, by each of the mysteries of His life, has merited for the Church incalculable graces, and by prayer, we lay hold of them. So, what power there must be in one rosary well said — which does not mean said with no distractions, but prayed with faith and for a supernatural goal.
There is something more. David by his intrepidity not only overcame Goliath, but also put fresh heart into the leaders of his army. When we take up our Lady’s sling, we should pray not only for the giant of Euthanasia to be cast face-down upon the earth, but also new strength to be given to our own captains, the bishops of the Church. It is clear that if any Catholic member of parliament should dare to vote in favour of death, or any Catholic support this bill in any public way, such a one must be excluded from Holy Communion until he repents. Not that priests should wait for their bishops expressly to command them in this matter; the law of the Church by itself makes clear the duty of ministers of Holy Communion to protect the Blessed Sacrament from public sinners.1 “Let us consider,” wrote St Francis of Assisi to his fellow clergy, “the great sin and ignorance that some bear in regard to the most holy Sacrament of the Body and Blood of our Lord … By many, it is put and left in poor places, it is wretchedly carried, unworthily received, and distributed to all comers.”2
Nevertheless, it is in the nature of things for the bishops to take the lead and the lower clergy to follow them. So, in this Rosary Crusade, we should pray first for the giant to be cast down, but then, for the captains to be bold. May our bishops give paternal warnings to all Catholic politicians, journalists, doctors, and nurses that they must not further the cause of death in any way, on pain of being excluded from the sacraments.
These are the goals for which we should take up our Lady’s sling, and use it with all our skill.
The faithful are asked to pray as many rosaries as they are able — whether five decades daily or even a single decade — during the Crusade, for the intention that the natural and divine law prevail against the killing of the innocent, in the UK and throughout the world.
This Crusade will be concluded by a public rosary in Old Palace Yard, Westminster, at midday on Friday 25 April 2025. For more information, please email info@voiceofthefamily.com.
Those in the UK are also encouraged to write to their MPs to urge them to vote against the Bill.
Resources
— Excellent Bill briefing by SPUC
— Find your MP
— How did my MP vote?
Notes
- See this 2007 scholarly study by the future Cardinal Raymond Burke. ↩︎
- St Francis of Assisi, First letter to clergy. ↩︎
This article has been reprinted with permission and can be found at voiceofthefamily.com/our-ladys-sling-rosary-crusade-against-the-giant-of-euthanasia.