An Inspirational Catholic

On May 20 this year, New Jersey’s Jeff Grabosky became the 18th person to run across the United States.

Jeff, 28, is unashamedly Catholic and began his run on the west coast of America on January 20thof St Sebastian, the patron saint of athletes. He woke at 4 am each morning, and over the course of 121 days ran up to 65 miles a day until he reached the east coast of America, in total covering 2,300 miles on foot, the equivalent of more than 141 marathons.

Jeff, a graduate of Notre Dame University and a great believer in the power of prayer, decided that he would not do this epic run for any particular charity, but for prayer. Jeff’s beloved mother passed away in October 2006, and he did the run in her memory.

Jeff’s run was an arduous pilgrimage. Each day he prayed continually. At all times Jeff carried a rosary ring and invited people to leave prayer requests on his website. He promised at least a decade for each intention. Many of the prayer intentions concerned sick children, which motivated Jeff to pray all the harder and he offered up the physical pain of the run for them.

This September Jeff will start work as a teaching assistant in a Catholic primary school in Phoenix, Arizona.