The number one podcast in the world to start out off the brand new yr doesn’t belong to Joe Rogan.
It doesn’t belong to Alex Cooper, Mel Robbins, or anybody from the Kelce clan.
It belongs to Father Mark-Mary Ames of Ascension Press. Or, actually, as he informed Fox News Digital, it belongs to God.
In a time when Bible sales are seeing a sudden spike amid analysis that implies persons are unsubscribing from religiosity at massive, it comes as considerably of a shock that “The Rosary in a Year (with Fr. Mark-Mary Ames, CFR)” climbed to #1 on Apple Podcasts to start out off the brand new yr — holding that spot for 3 consecutive days earlier than falling to a noteworthy #2 on January 4.
Its humble host is the director of communications and the director of Priestly Studies of the Franciscan Friars of the Renewal (CFR), whose main mission is the “wholehearted embracing of Jesus Christ and their Holy Father, St. Francis of Assisi.”
The “Habits for Holiness” writer sat down with Fox News Digital at SEEK25 DC, a four-day occasion consisting of convention classes, world-class Catholic keynote audio system, music, mass and adoration for anybody in search of their pillars of prayer, fellowship, inspiration, and leisure. There, he defined the whole lot from what motivated him to dwell a virtuous life, what the rosary is actually meant to be, and the way he actually feels in regards to the success of his podcast.
Podcast legend Joe Rogan’s ‘The Joe Rogan Experience’ presently sits at #3 on Apple Podcast’s Top Shows, simply behind Father Mark-Mary Ames’ ‘The Rosary in a Year,’ which fell to #2 on January 4th after three consecutive days of topping the chart.
Father Mark-Mary Ames, who was born and raised in Orange County, California in what he described as a “rich household,” mentioned he was impressed by Mother Teresa to surrender a lifetime of privilege for the service of others.
“I heard that there is a group of Franciscans in New York who’re hardcore and sleep on the bottom. And I seemed them up, and I learn our constitutions — that are what we are saying we’re about — and I’m like, ‘if that is true, that is the whole lot I’m on the lookout for.’ So I used to be a really, very regular child, on a standard path. And then God simply type of made this occur.”
“I’m made to provide my life to the poorest of the poor,” he added. “The huge, deep expertise of my life is what God’s achieved in generosity. And so there’s nothing I’ve left behind or sacrificed that he hasn’t been repaid a hundred-fold. It’s in new and deeper methods.”
Though it isn’t the work he’s most happy with, the priest spoke to Fox News Digital about being handed the baton from successful Ascension Press alum Father Mike Schmitz for his “Rosary in a Year” podcast, describing the rosary itself as “the good treatment for our time.”
“There’s one thing specific that God wants to do through Mary that additionally continues now. So, it is attention-grabbing that even Mary’s the one who continues to come back,” he mentioned. “I believe the primary factor is [that] there appears to be some type of particular grace given by God to the Rosary the place he desires to do some particular work. And the rosary is the factor that unlocks it. It opens the door to grace.”
‘The Rosary in a Year’ podcast was #1 on Apple in all classes, forward of Joe Rogan, for 3 days to start out off 2025.
The rosary may be complicated and even intimidating for some — however the priest asserts it’s truly “excellent.”
“Praying the rosary… is like bodily remedy for the soul.”
“It took a whole lot of years to be developed to get to what it’s, as an ideal prayer that has our method of receiving and coming to God,” he mentioned. “But additionally, it is actually good for our humanity. We’re in every single place. It’s actually exhausting for us to focus and to pay attention and the human potential to focus within the concrete for an prolonged time period is considerably of like, the muse on which prayer is constructed. It’s going to be actually exhausting to listen to God, to come back to God, if you cannot concentrate in any respect. And so I believe there’s part of praying the rosary, which is like bodily remedy for the soul. The content material works the focus muscle inside. It’s actually atrophied.”
While his podcast serves to interrupt down each of the Marian mysteries and the construction of this excellent prayer with palatability in thoughts, providing each seasoned meditators and newcomers alike an opportunity to grasp it in deeper methods, Father Mark-Mary revealed that the devotion of the rosary can truly be a personalised expertise — including to its perfection.
“[Praying the rosary] just isn’t truly a commandment, however you do must go to Mass on Sunday,” he mentioned, explaining the distinction between devotional and liturgical prayer. “And so throughout the devotional are good, good issues. Whether or not it’s a very good factor for you, there’s truly some house so that you can make that call inside it. There’s way more house for personalization.”
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The rosary skilled went on to admit that even he can lose focus when praying it.
“1,000,000 %,” he admitted. “And that’s one thing that’s like…it shouldn’t be controversial to folks or put them off. This is my very own journey as a result of I need to do higher and develop deeper.”
That was the very motivation — or calling, as he described it — that compelled him to signal on to host “The Rosary in a Year.”
“I simply attempt to be trustworthy to what’s earlier than me. And if God desires to make this factor primary, superior. If he desires to do all types of superior, that is form of for him.”
Despite its success to this point, the well-known friar informed Fox News Digital there are “extra lovely” issues taking place on the earth the media does not shine a highlight on:
“There’s many, many individuals in my life who’re doing issues which are way more lovely and way more shifting than having a podcast hit primary. People simply do not learn about it,” he mentioned. “I’m very grateful for the podcast, its recognition, and it is a supply of grace for folks and serving to them pray. [But] it’s not the toughest factor I do. It’s not probably the most honorable factor I do. And it is undoubtedly not probably the most heroic or type of shifting factor that my brothers and neighbors do.”
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