Catholic Olympic skier devoted to Frassati
Share:FacebookX

Catholic Olympic skier devoted to Frassati

One of the US Olympic hopefuls competing in Turin is a Catholic cross-country skier, wife, and mother who happens to have a devotion to Blessed Pier Giorgio. Here is Rebecca Dussault’s blog and her web site and an article on her blog written by a priest about her.

Rebecca Dussault, was born in Denver and is now a resident of Gunnison, Colorado in the Diocese of Pueblo. She is Eight Time U.S. National Cross Country Ski Champion and Top Ranked U.S. Women’s Nordic Skier. She will be representing our Nation at the 2006 Winter Olympics in Turin (a.k.a. Torino), Italy. She has named Pier Giorgio her “patron on the Journey to the Olympics.” When she competes she will have the name of our friend written on her skis, along with the Sign of the Cross with which she always marks them.

I admire Pier Giorgio (1901-1925), and am beginning to admire Rebecca. Not only is she an extraordinarily gifted athlete; she is, first and foremost, a devoted Catholic, wife and mother. Born in 1980, the then Rebecca Quinn racked up major championships in the 1990’s and was seen as one of the most promising Cross Country Skiers. She married her high school sweetheart Sharbel Dussault in 1999, soon went into retirement to focus on her family, and a couple of years later (2001) had a baby boy they named Tabor. She reflects on retiring at the edge of greatness (and her subsequent return): “I felt like the Lord wanted me to give everything to Him. I had no idea He was going to give it back to me. It’s been a hundredfold. It’s been so much better than I ever thought it could be.”

This leads me to remind you all about my own Bl. Pier Giorgio Frassati web page. It’s been online since 1996, over a decade! I’ve gotten hundreds of thousands of visitors to the page over the years, from people who were just as inspired by his story as I was.

[Thanks to Jeff Miller for the link.]

Technorati Tags: , , , ,

Share:FacebookX

Archives

Categories