{"id":22157,"date":"2017-09-23T22:58:00","date_gmt":"2017-09-23T22:58:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.catholicnewsagency.com\/news\/my-cousin-the-martyr-meet-blessed-stanley-rothers-large-family-72009\/"},"modified":"2017-09-23T22:58:00","modified_gmt":"2017-09-23T22:58:00","slug":"my-cousin-the-martyr-meet-blessed-stanley-rothers-large-family","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/2017\/09\/my-cousin-the-martyr-meet-blessed-stanley-rothers-large-family\/","title":{"rendered":"My cousin the martyr: meet Blessed Stanley Rother’s large family"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

<\/p>\n

Oklahoma City, Okla., Sep 23, 2017 \/ 04:58 pm (CNA\/EWTN News<\/a>).- They came from Illinois and they came from Wisconsin. They came from Colorado, Arizona, and New Mexico.<\/p>\n

They came from Minnesota\u2013three or four buses worth. At least 16 cars made the drive down from Nebraska.<\/p>\n

The many, many, first, second and third cousins of Father Stanley Rother descended on Oklahoma City like the Boomers of old descended on the Oklahoma plains when there was free land for the claiming. But this time, they came to watch one of their own become \u201cBlessed\u201d in the eyes of the Church.<\/p>\n

Fr. Stanley was born in 1935, and grew up with his parents and four siblings in the rural farming town of Okarche, Okla. He became a priest in 1963 and was martyred in 1981 in Guatemala at the age of 46, after serving as a missionary there for 13 years.<\/p>\n

He was beatified on Sept. 23 at the Cox Convention Center in Oklahoma City. His two surviving siblings, Sister Marita and Tom Rother, as well as hundreds of extended relatives, were in attendance at the Mass, along with 14,000 of the faithful.<\/p>\n

Doris Horne was in charge of mobilizing the Nebraska contingent. Many Rother relations are from the small town of Humphrey, Nebraska, while others have settled in the Columbus, Ohio area.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere are 140 of us from my Grandmother Smith-Fuchs side here, from six states,\u201d she told CNA as she sat amongst many of them at the Cox Convention Center before the beatification Mass for Fr. Stanley Rother, her second cousin.<\/p>\n

Horne\u2019s parents were first cousins to Fr. Stanley\u2019s parents. Although she never met Fr. Stanley, Horne said she remembered his parents coming to visit. She was also able to make a pilgrimage to his mission in Guatemala on the 25th anniversary of his death.<\/p>\n

\u201cEveryone down there loved him, and the churches were packed\u201d for the occassion, she recalled. \u201cHe was so loved down there.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t know how to put it into words, but it\u2019s an honor. We pray to him all the time, and I\u2019m just honored to be part of the family,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

Cousins have always been an important part of life for Fr. Stanley Rother, who came from a German Catholic family. The first wedding he ever celebrated was that of his cousin Kay Rother and her husband.<\/p>\n

These days, Kay volunteers a lot at Holy Trinity parish in Okarche, Okla., where Fr. Stanley went to church and school. She said it\u2019s probably a good thing Fr. Stanley wasn\u2019t alive to witness all of his beatification happenings.<\/p>\n

\u201cWith all this going on, he would not want it,\u201d she said with a mixture of humor and bemusement, gesturing to the small crowd of journalists and distant relatives descending on the otherwise quiet parish grounds the day before the beatification Mass.<\/p>\n

Stanley was a humble, quiet person and would have loathed being the center of attention, Kay explained.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe wouldn\u2019t like all the hubub,\u201d she said. \u201cHe was very quiet and humble, and he didn\u2019t brag on what he did.\u201d<\/p>\n

Besides being a cousin and the celebrant of her wedding, Fr. Stanley is dear to Kay for another important reason: she credits his intercession for saving the life of her daughter, Amber.<\/p>\n

Several years ago, when Amber was just in her early twenties, she had a brain aneurysm rupture. The first hospital said there was nothing to be done except to take her upstairs and harvest her organs. Another hospital said if Amber lived, she\u2019d spend her life in a vegetative state.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s when Kay\u2019s husband called on Stan.<\/p>\n

\u201cMy husband said don\u2019t worry about it, I\u2019m going to the cemetery. So he went to the cemetery and said \u2018okay Stan, time for you to work.\u2019 And three days later she opened her eyes, and today you\u2019d never know it,\u201d Kay said. Amber is healthy, and happily married, with one child.<\/p>\n

Fr. Stan is a big reason she\u2019s spent the past 30 years volunteering at the parish. Even in the midst of the beatification chaos, Kay was trying to fix the air conditioning in the church that had stopped working \u201ctoday of all days.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI just felt like I owed it to him. It\u2019s the least I can do,\u201d Kay said, doing her best to hold back the tears.<\/p>\n

When Fr. Stanley was killed in 1981, his heart remained interned at the altar in Santiago Atitlan, Guatemala. His body was flown back to Okarche, where it was buried in Holy Trinity\u2019s cemetery until just a few months ago, when his remains were moved to a temporary resting place in the archdiocese, pending the completion of a shrine in his honor.<\/p>\n

But his headstone still marks the original plot in the Holy Trinity Cemetery. \u201cPadre A\u2019plas\u201d, it reads, the name for Father Francis in the native Guatemalan language of Tzutuhil, which he had learned to speak fluently.<\/p>\n

Lee Rother and his family visited the cemetery the Friday before the beatification Mass, to honor Fr. Stanley, as well as the other Rother relatives buried there. As he walked through the grounds, Lee recalled fond memories of the people whose gravestones he passed. He must have known at least half of the people buried there.<\/p>\n

Lee himself has settled in Minnesota, along with many of the other Rother relatives. He told CNA that he has given talks on Fr. Stanley, his third cousin, and is inspired by his faith.<\/p>\n

\u201cHow he lived, how he served God and his people\u2013he had a tremendous, deep faith in him,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

This was something Fr. Stanley passed on to the Guatemalans he served.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat parish flourished after he died, because he gave them a faith that they could lean on in the midst of their oppression,\u201d he said, his excitement about his cousin palpale.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a tremendous thrill, it\u2019s so exhilarating to have a relative who\u2019s being beatified by the Catholic Church,\u201d he said. \u201cThe best thing that\u2019s ever happened to the Rother family.\u201d<\/p>\n

Kathy Rother is a cousin of Father Stanley\u2019s who knew him growing up. Her family lived just a few miles down the road, and she went to school with Stanley and his siblings.<\/p>\n

Kathy fondly remembered Stanley as a kind, brotherly figure, someone who once stopped the bullies on the bus from picking on her.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe big boys would like to pick on the little kids because they were bored. They\u2019d pull their hair or take your lunchbox,\u201d Kathy said.<\/p>\n

\u201cI remember one time I was the butt of the jokes\u2026 and I remember looking around for one of my older brothers to rescue me, and they didn\u2019t, but there was Stan sitting there and he patted the empty seat next to him, and I sat there and they left me alone, the boys just backed off,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

\u201cit wasn\u2019t like Stan was a sissy, he was very self-contained, he knew what was right, and it wasn\u2019t right to be picking on little kids,\u201d she said. \u201cHe was very much looked up to.\u201d<\/p>\n

Kathy still remembers getting the news of her cousin\u2019s untimely death. \u201cThat cut me to the heart\u201d, she remembered, her eyes tearing up. But then, look what came of it, she added, smiling.<\/p>\n

And he\u2019s still there for her, though this time its through his prayers in heaven, rather than rescuing her from bus bullies.<\/p>\n

\u201cMany times I\u2019ve called on Stan (in prayer),\u201d Kathy said. \u201cAnd he comes through.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n<\/a>\n<\/div>\n

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Oklahoma City, Okla., Sep 23, 2017 \/ 04:58 pm (CNA\/EWTN News).- They came from Illinois and they came from Wisconsin. They came from Colorado, Arizona, and New Mexico.<\/p>\n

They came from Minnesota–three or four buses worth. At least 16 cars made the driv…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1031,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-22157","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-us"],"yoast_head":"\nMy cousin the martyr: meet Blessed Stanley Rother's large family<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Oklahoma City, Okla., Sep 23, 2017 \/ 04:58 pm (CNA\/EWTN News).- They came from Illinois and they came from Wisconsin. They came from Colorado, Arizona, and New Mexico. They came from Minnesota--three or four buses worth. 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