The Rosary Priest: Father Patrick Peyton

In 1941, Father Patrick Peyton needed to honor a bargain. Thirteen years earlier, Peyton left his native Ireland for America. While he completed his high school education, he worked as a janitor in Scranton, Pennsylvania’s cathedral. Then, in 1932, he entered the novitiate for the Holy Cross Fathers. All was going well until Peyton started coughing up blood. The diagnosis came in 1939: advanced tuberculosis.

The prognosis was grim. Peyton, however, struck a deal with the Blessed Mother: if she healed him, he would dedicate his life to promoting peace through the Rosary.

She accepted the deal. All signs of tuberculosis disappeared, and on June 15, 1941, Peyton became a Catholic priest.

To uphold his end of the bargain, Father Peyton turned to the mass media, which he used to help those devastated by war understand that peace in the world begins with peace in individual hearts and homes. As he explained in the slogan he popularized, “The family that prays together stays together. A world at prayer is a world at peace.”

To help people put that slogan into action, Peyton launched the Family Theater and Family Rosary Crusade.

Over the course of seven decades (and counting), Family Theater has produced a long-running hit radio program as well as television specials and films that, in earlier decades, featured -A-list Hollywood stars—such as Bing Crosby, Grace Kelly, and Loretta Young—promoting faith, prayer, and family values.

For its part, the Family Rosary Crusade sought to popularize the idea of a nightly family Rosary and continues to sponsor Rosary rallies around the world. During Peyton’s lifetime, the movement spread to Europe, Asia, and Latin America (the latter with the help of the CIA, who decided the Rosary was as good a weapon as any in the fight against communism).

Before his death, those efforts earned Father Peyton the nickname “The Rosary Priest.” After his death, on June 3, 1992, they also earned him the title “Servant of God.” Pope Francis declared him “Venerable” on December 18, 2017.

Elizabeth Kidney, April 29, 2024

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